THE CHOLERA A VISITATION OF GOD. given into the custody of every father of a family. And we are persuaded that if there be one thing on this earth which, more than another, draws the sorrowing regards of the world of spirits, it must be the system of education pursued by the generality of parents. The entering a room gracefully is a vast deal more attended to than the entering into heaven; and you would conclude that the grand thing for which God had sent the child into the world, was that it might catch the Italian accent, and be quite at home in every note of the gamut. Christianity, indeed, is not at variance with the elegancies of life; she can use them as her handmaids, and give them a beauty of which, out of her service, they are utterly destitute. We wage no war, therefore, with accomplishments, any more than with the solid acquirements of a liberal education. We are only anxious to press on you the necessity that ye make religion the basis of your system. We admit, in all its breadth, the truth of the saying, that knowledge is power. It is power-ay, a fatal power, and a perilous. Neither the might of armies nor the scheming of politicians avails any thing against this power. The schoolmaster, as we have already hinted, is the grand engine for revolutionizing a world. Let knowledge be generally diffused, and the fear of God be kept in the background, and you have done the same for a country as if you had laid the gunpowder under its very institution; there needs only the igniting of a match, and the land shall be strewed with the fragments of all that is glorious and venerable. But, nevertheless, we would not have knowledge chained up in the college and monastery, because its arm is endowed with such sinew and nerve. We would not put forth a finger to uphold a system which we believed based on the ignorance of a population. We only desire to see knowledge of God advance as the vanguard of the host of information. We are sure that an intellectual must be a mighty peasantry. But we are equally sure that an intellectual and a godless will demonstrate their might, by the ease with which they crush whatever most adorns and elevates a kingdom. And in speaking to you individually of your duties as parents, we would bring into the family circle the principles thus announced as applicable to the national. We want not to set bounds to the amount of knowledge which you strive to impart. But never let this remembrance be swept from your minds, that, to give a child knowledge, without endeavouring, at the same time, to add to knowledge godliness, is to do your best to throw the momentum of the giant into the arm of the idiot; to construct a machinery which may help to move a world, and to leave out the spring which would insure its moving it only towards God.-H. Melville. MY MOTHER'S VOICE. My Mother's voice! I hear it now! As when, in heartfelt joy, My Mother's voice! I hear it now' As in that early hour, When fever throbb'd through all my veins, And that kind hand first sooth'd my pains, With healing power. My Mother's voice! It sounds as when She read to me of holy men The Patriarchs of old; And gazing downward in my face, She seem'd each infant thought to trace, My young eyes told, 261 It comes when thoughts unhallow'd throng, And whispers round my heart Though round my heart, all, all beside- THE CHOLERA A VISITATION OF GOD. THE Christian acknowledges the hand of God in every affliction; that sickness and death are, in each instance, ordered by Him. But men in general do not recognise an overruling Providence except in some wide-spread calamity. Yet even the most thoughtless must be impressed with the feeling that the epidemic, now prevailing in this city and elsewhere, is a visitation from God. There are several reasons for this impression. The specific cause of cholera is unknown. Proximate or predisposing causes are quite obvious. But no investigation has yet been able to detect the cause of this terrible disease; no medical authority has yet defined its nature. The fact that an invisible, unknown agent is working death on all sides, strikes the mind with awe of a Higher Power. The remedy for cholera, if there is a specific remedy, is equally unknown. Taken in its earlier stages, in the period called cholerine, it is a manageable disease, and physicians undertake cases with a good degree of confidence. But there is no agreement among them as to the treatment of a patient | in the state of collapse. There is not merely that diversity of treatment which always exists under different theories of disease, but that greater diversity which exists where there is no theory, no settled principle, no knowledge, no guide. The highest medical authorities here confess their ignorance. They do not venture to attribute the recovery of a patient in this stage to their treatment; they say of him "he got well," not that "he was cured." They state the facts in books and lectures, but do not draw from them a theory. This confessed inability of those to whom we confide ourselves in sickness to grapple with this "monster malady," makes us feel that we are in the hands of God. This feeling is deepened by the mortality of cholera cases. Even in the milder type of the disease at the present season, the deaths by cholera in this city have averaged fifty per cent. of the cases; and if in reporting cases the line should be drawn between cholerine and cholera asphyxia, the proportion of deaths from cholera proper would be greatly increased. This makes us feel that God has commissioned the angel of death. The suddenness of the attack, and the rapidity with which death follows in this disease, bring us to realize that in God's hand", our breath is. boldly upon change. He glides into the dimness of the counting-house. He steps into the workshop. He goes out upon the farm. The theatre, the ballroom, the race-course, and the tavern, are all peculiarly the scenes of his most successful transactions. It is the buyer of souls. He has various prices in his infernal traffic. He bought a soul, in one case, for thirty pieces of silver. He has bought some, we fear, for less. But for a larger price, for inestimable wealth, for countless riches, for heaps that will shine and glitter in men's eyes, O, how many have exchanged their souls! And then for fame and applause, the noisy breath of the multitude, and for guilty, transient, unsatisfying pleasures, how many more have bartered their immortal spirits! The fact that the cholera ordinarily comes as a rebuke for the transgression of some law of our physical or moral nature, as the consequence of some imprudence or exposure, and more commonly of excess and debauchery, renders it a voice of warning from God, and a token of His retributive justice. The extent to which it paralyses business, by spreading alarm through the community, and causing the place of its presence to be shunned-though such alarm is excessive, and sometimes even ground. less-brings men to feel the hand of God touching their plans and treasures, and humbling their hearts. We might speak also of the uncertainty of the progress of this epidemic, and its wonderful diffusiveness; but enough has been said to illustrate the remark that the cholera is a visitation of God. But while we distinctly recognise that fact, it should occasion us no anxiety, no apprehension. We should be able to think of God as on our right hand and on our left, without being terrified. We should walk We are about to relate the history of one exchange. softly before Him, we should fear to offend Him, Some years since, the writer sat in the midst of a we should be still and know that He is God-but we weeping congregation. It was the middle of the should feel that He before whom goeth the pesti-week, but the Spirit of God was abroad upon the lence is our Father, reconciled through Jesus Christ. Our chief solicitude as Christians at such a time should be for souls that are ready to perish, and our prayers should be for them that God would withhold His judgments and renew His converting grace.-Independent. A PRESCRIPTION FOR SUDDEN DISEASE. PREVENTION is not all that wisdom suggests at any time, especially at a time like this. It becomes us to prepare for a form of sickness, perhaps of death, which may come at any day or hour. There is in Isaiah a prescription worthy of universal regard. "Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him: and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." Forsaking of wicked ways, whether they are the ways of the inebriate, the libertine, the Sabbath-breaker, the profane swearer, or whatever ways of sin, is indispensable to a suitable preparation for sickness or death in any form. Turning unto the Lord, who "will have mercy and abundantly pardon," is the best of all security in every hour of need. And the hour of need may be very near. It may be the present hour. While you are reading this, the destroyer may be at your door. Have peace with God, through the Lord Jesus Christ, and if disease in its most terrific form shall come, your peace will be of essential service in enabling you to throw off the malady. If that cannot be done, then surely you will need, all the more, for the dying hour, the peace which will enable you to say, "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" There is an appointed time of dying for all. If we have the needed preparation for death and what is beyond it, we need not be solicitous about the means which our heavenly Father appoints to remove us from the earth. If the passage of Jordan is rugged and dark, it may be quick. If we arrive at the blessed haven of eternal rest, it will matter little to us whether we were wafted by gentle winds, or were driven there in a tornado.-N. Y. Evangelist. THE PRICE OF A SOUL. THERE is a buyer in the markets of the world whose name is never in the newspapers, and whose bids are never in the prices current. Nevertheless, his business is widely extended, and pursued with ceaseless activity. He chaffers in the open street. He walks hearts of the people, and they came willingly to the sanctuary of God. It was solemn without the walls of the old church, for an ancient forest waved around it, and hard by the dust of our fathers was sleeping; and solemn within, for God's Spirit brooded over the vast assembly. A young and earnest servant of Christ was addressing them, and well do I remember how the hearts of all were thrilled, and how their tears started, at the narration of the following sad! tale. "A few years ago," said he, "there was living in one of our large cities, a young lady, who was the only child of wealthy and worldly parents. She was fond of the gay pleasures of the city, and plunged into them with all the enthusiasm of youth. Her gaiety, youth, and wealth, were sure passports to the highest circles of fashion, and there she lived as though there were no higher world. "While thus living in pleasure, she was asked one evening by a female friend to accompany her to the weekly prayer-meeting in a church of the city. There the Spirit of God met her, and awakened in her the consciousness of sin, and bowed down her heart in anguish at the thought of her guilt. Her heaviness of spirit was soon discovered at home, and her parents were in consternation lest their beautiful daughter should leave the circles of pleasure for the service of God. They besought her and commanded her to return to the gay world. They surrounded her with her fashionable friends. But there was a power above theirs at work, and she was still stricken in heart. At last those parents actually bribed her to attend a large party of pleasure, by the gift of the richest dress that could be purchased in the city. She reluctantly consented - went to the festival, and returned without one trace of her religious emotions. She had put out the light of grace. "But the joy of her miserable parents was short. In another week their daughter was at the point of death, and the skilful physicians they summoned, in their alarm, could only tell them that there was no hope. "When this opinion was made known to the dying girl, she lay for a few minutes in perfect silence: THE MADAGASCAR MARTYRS. Her soul seemed to be surveying the past, and looking into the awful future. Then rousing herself, she ordered a servant to bring that dress and hang it upon the post of her bed. She next sent for her father and mother. In a few minutes they stood weeping at her side. She looked upon each of them for a time, and then lifting up her hand, and pointing to the dress, said to each of them distinctly, and with the terrible calmness of despair, Father, mother, there is the price of my soul.'” O what a disastrous exchange was that! A precious soul, with all its hopes and aspirations, its immortal powers, and high endowments, for a dress. How infatuated those guilty parents! How full of fearful danger is the strife against the Holy Ghost! Reader, what is the price for which thou art parting with thy soul? FOR MINISTERS. PRAYER FOR THE PEOPLE.-He who is more frequently in the pulpit before his people than he is in his closet for his people, is but a sorry watchman. Dr Conder. SOLEMNITY AND FERVOUR.-Let the saying of the ancients be remembered, "He who trifles in the pulpit shall weep in hell;" and the modern saying, "Cold preachers make bold sinners.”—Mather. BE FAITHFUL.-Brethren, you will shortly appear before an impartial God; see that ye be impartial stewards. Take the same care, manifest the same love, attend with the same diligence to the poorest and weakest souls that are committed to your care, as you do to the rich, the great, the honourable. Remember that all souls are rated at one value in your Master's book, and your Redeemer paid as much for the one as for the other. Civil differences must be civilly acknowledged; but these have no place in our spiritual administrations.-Flavel. STUDY THE BIBLE.-One capital error in men's preparing themselves for the sacred function is, that they read divinity more in other books than in the Scriptures.-Bishop Burnet. USE METAPHORS JUDICIOUSLY.-Mr Keach's work on Scriptural Metaphors has done more to debase the taste of both preachers and people than any other work of the kind. Metaphors should be used sparingly and with judgment.-Dr A. Clarke. Divine InfluencE.-If there be a truth in Scripture explicit and decided, it is this, that the success of the ministry of the gospel in the conversion of men is the consequence of Divine influence; and if there be a well-ascertained fact in ecclesiastical story, it is, that no great and indisputable effects of this kind have been produced but by men who have acknowledged this truth, and gone forth in humble dependence upon that promised co-operation contained in the words " And lo! I am with you alway, even to the end of the world."-Richard Watson. How careful should I and all be, in our ministry, not to break the bruised reed! Alas! do I think that a schoolboy, a raw academic, should be likely to lead the hearts of men? What a knowledge of men, and acquaintance with the Scriptures, what 263 communion with God, and study of my own heart, ought to prepare me for the awful work of a messenger from God on the business of the soul!-Henry Martyn. CALLING ON DIFFERENT PEOPLE.-What shall I think on my death-bed of all these opportunities of warning sinners? O may the Lord seal upon my soul such a compassionate sense of their danger, that I may never have a heart to talk triflingly with them!-Ibid. WHEN MAY DAILY PRAYER BE NEGLECTED? If there be any day in which we are quite certain that we shall meet with no trial from Providence, no temptation from the world-any day in which we shall be sure to have no wrong tempers excited in ourselves, no call to bear with those of others, no misfortune to encounter, and no need of Divine assistance to endure it—on that morning we may safely omit prayer. If there be an evening in which we have received no protection from God, and experienced no mercy at his hands; if we have not neglected a single opportunity of doing or receiving good; if we are quite certain that we have not once spoken unadvisedly with our lips, nor entertained one vain or idle thought in our heart-on that night we may safely omit to praise God, and to confess our own sinfulness; on that night we may safely omit humiliation and thanksgiving.-Hannah More. PRAYER-MEETINGS. Ir is very important that a prayer-meeting should not be wearisome. Such prayer meetings will be not merely uninviting, but repulsive; and what is of prayer, and induce a habit of contented mockery! worse, in those who attend it may destroy the spirit A prayer-meeting should be conducted with spirit. A dull and heavy mode of conducting a meeting will make it dull and heavy. The person conducting the meeting should be prepared. No time should be lost in turning over leaves. A passage of Scripture, short, and selected for point and impressiveness, should be read; and a few verses, selected in like manner, should be sung. Any remarks should be pertinent and brief. On this point every one should examine himself carefully and unsparingly; for we do not tell to each other our faults; and we shall not, without painstaking and impartiality, suspect our own faults. A prayer-meeting should be confined carefully within its limited time. It is far better that people leave a meeting remarking that it has long. In case different members of a meeting conbroken up too soon, than that it has been held too duct it in turns, the member should be named at the preceding meeting, that he may be present and prepared. Variety may thus be given. These are small matters; but small things do not always produce small consequences. THE MADAGASCAR MARTYRS. FOURTEEN Christians in Madagascar, who, during the persecutions there, had spent two wretched years as fugitives in the mountains, determined to go to i the seaside and sail to Mauritius. On their way they were taken prisoners, and conducted to the city. A deeply interesting circumstance transpired as these Christians were on their way to the capital, after being apprehended. On reaching the town of you Beferona, a guard was set upon them. They were told that their manner of travelling was suspicious, and not like that of other people, having lanterns at night, and striking into unusual paths. Three days successively they underwent examination; and, on the third, they resolved to witness the good confession, and therefore made the following declaration, through Adriamanena, one of their number, whom they had appointed as their spokesman: Since ask us again and again, we will tell you. We are not banditti nor murderers: we are (impivavaka) pray|ing people; and if this make us guilty in the kingdom of the queen, then, whatever the queen does, we submit to suffer." "Is this, then," said the interrogator, "your final reply, whether for life or for death?" "It is our final reply," they said, "whether for life or death." "Who," asked the examiner, "sent you from Tananarivo?" "No one," they replied, "we went forth of our own free-will." After the Christians made these declarations, it is said that they felt inexpressible peace and joy. They had prayed; they had confessed Christ; and now that concealment was at an end, and they could freely open their overburdened hearts, they said to each other, "Now we are in the situation of Christian and Faithful when they were led to the city of Vanity Fair." And so it proved, when a majority of them underwent the martyr's death after the example of Faithful. HALL'S OPINION OF MISS EDGEWORTH. "MISS EDGEWORTH," says Robert Hall," is the most irreligious writer I ever read; not so much from any direct attacks she makes on religion, as from a universal and studied omission of the subject. In her writings you meet a high strain of morality. She delineates the most virtuous characters, and represents them in the most affecting circumstances in life, in distress, in sickness, and even in the immediate prospect of eternity, and finally sends them off the stage with their virtue unimpaired-and all this without the remotest allusion to religion. She does not directly oppose religion, but makes it appear unnecessary, by exhibiting a perfect virtue without it. No works ever produced so bad an effect on my own mind. I did not expect to find any irreligion in Miss Edgeworth's writings. I was off my guard; their moral character disarmed me. I read nine volumes of them at once; but I could not preach with any comfort for six weeks after reading them. I never felt so little ardour in my profession, or so little interest in religion. She was once called to account for the character of her works, and asked her reasons for representing a mere ideal morality, without attributing any influence to religion. She said, that if she had written for the lower classes, she should have recommended religion; but that she had written for a class for whom it was less necessary. How absurd! She seemed to think that the virtues of the higher orders of society stand in no need of religion, and that it was only designed as a curb and a muzzle for the brute." COMMON UNREASONABLENESS. SOME Christians occasionally speak as if their pastor should know, by intuition, every current event in their history. Hence should they themselves, or any member of their family, be unexpectedly laid under God's afflicting hand, or summoned suddenly to pass through some peculiarly painful ordeal, wonder is expressed, and certain feelings, half-choked by emotion, are when in fact he was totally ignorant of the painful vented, because the minister" has not once called," dispensation, and knew not but that the family were as happy and as well as when last he saw them in his pastoral rounds. Such individuals forget the way in which the New Testament churches acted on similar occasions. They overlook the injunction of heaven in the case, "Is any among you sick? let him call for the elders of the church." Where this command is neglected, instead of wondering at the non-appearance of the pastor, the parties' own want of consideration ought to be the subject of the deepest amazement.-A. M. Stalker. THE SABBATH. THE Sabbath is old as the creation. Let me feel the reverence due to an institution so originated and of such antiquity; and let me take an especial iesson from the use to which it was appointed by God. He rested from the labours of the preceding week. I O that I could make the day thus set apart, and for such a purpose, a day of holy rest from the secularities and cares of our everyday world! Thereby I should at once both sanctify and enjoy it, making it a day alike of pleasure and profit to my soul. for this end let my conversation be in heaven-let my pleasure lie in communion with God. Quicken me, O Lord! with a sense and perception of the things of faith.-Dr Chalmers. But WHENCE AND WHITHER. WHEN Philip Henry, the father of the celebrated commentator, sought the hand of the only daughter and heiress of Mr Matthews in marriage, an objection was made by her father, who admitted that he was a gentleman, a scholar, and an excellent preacher; but he was a stranger, and "they did not even know where he came from," "True," said the daughter, who had well weighed the excellent qualities of the stranger, " but I know where he is going, and I should like to go with him;" and they walked life's pilgrimage together. THE CHRISTIAN'S TRUST. TRUST in God though you are in darkness, though you see no light; this is light before light, pardon before pardon. Trust God in temptations, and you are above temptations while you groan under the burden of them. Trust God in weakness, and you are strong. Paul in such a case besought the Lord thrice, and was answered with this (2 Cor. xii. 9):) "My grace" (not thy grace)" is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness." (He does not say, thy weakness is perfected unto strength). This satisfied Paul, and he exclaims, in the next words, "Most gladly, therefore, will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me."-Caryl. DYING WORDS OF POPE PIUS V. It is said of Pius Quintus, that when dying he cried out in despair: "When I was in low condition, I had some hopes of salvation; when I was advanced to be a cardinal, I greatly doubted it; but since I came to the popedom, I have no hope at all." THE CHRISTIAN TREASURY. 265 THE MERCY OF GOD. BY THE LATE REV. WALTER PATERSON, KIRKURD.* "Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon "-Isa. iv. 7. Ir is a remarkable circumstance, that the two passions which exercise the greatest influence on our conduct, in regard to the life which now is, namely, hope and fear, are likewise most prominently called into action by the cares of the spiritual world. They seem, indeed, to have their proper field, and full range, for the expansion of their capabilities in the contemplation of eternity alone; and just inasmuch as they fall short of heaven on the one side, and hell on the other, or the uttermost that either the mercy or the wrath of God can do to an immortal soul, are they defrauded of their natural food, and curtailed of the aim for which they were contrived. Hence are the Scriptures chiefly made up of promises and threatenings, that, merely grazing as it were the present world in their course, have their aim and fulfilment in the infinite beyond the grave. It is a besetting sin of our nature, however, that we are slow in gathering fear from the darkest forms of futurity, or hope from its brightest visions; and still more remarkable perhaps is that perverseness of disposition, that hurries at one time our trust in the mercy of God, and at another the alarms of an awakened conscience, to a dangerous excess. It is the will of God that we shall use all diligence in working out our salvation with fear and trembling, rejoicing in "the lively hope to which we have been begotten through the resurrection of Christ from the dead;" and in the assurance that, all the while, it is the Spirit of God who worketh in us to will and to do of his good pleasure. But just as, at one time, the father of lies lulls us into the belief that we can be saved without Christ, so do we allow him, in our moments of fear, to persuade us that we cannot be saved, even with him. For at no moment of life is the arch enemy of God and mankind more busy with our ears, than just when he sees us, for the first time, turning round to the mercy of the Father manifested in the Son, and with the very same hope that in the fulness of time kept him continually * From a paper furnished by the lamented author to the "Christian's Daily Companion." hovering about the Redeemer's steps, will ten thousand spirits of darkness and evil, in a moment at once so critical and perilous, flap their bat-like wings between the trembling soul and the countenance of God, in the full assurance that if they suffer us but once to behold the face of the Father, as it is seen in Christ, we are for ever lost to Satan and to hell. And no sooner is one of them driven away than another fills up his place, with a change of form and aspect suited to the sinner's changing case, and hovering right before his eye, in whatever direction he seeks to lay hold on the mercy of the Lord. The self same spirit of lies which, in his days of ease and carelessness, represented his sins as harmless, trivial, and far beneath the notice of the Divine eye, will now dash them with such a depth of crimson that no hyssop can wash them out; and the same foul fiend who before spake of no attribute in the divine nature but mercy-who for all the hesitations and compunctions of his human dupe had always the same drivelling answer ready in his mouth, God is merciful-will now talk of no attribute but his inviolable holiness, justice, and truth, and of no passion but his anger, with its treasures of tribulation and anguish for every soul of man that doeth evil. All the while, moreover, is the inborn spirit of unbelief just as busy in the sinner's own bosom, persuading him that he is not in all God's thoughts-and that, weary with the long waste of words, discipline, and tenderness, the Lord hath given him over to waste, in turn, his tears upon the desert, and sow the wind with his vain complaints. The frequency and fervour indeed with which the assurances of divine mercy are repeated and pressed upon our notice in Scripture, are at once a proof of its own abundance, and of our slowness to believe in its sufficiency. No devil surely can make us believe that God does not know his own mind; and just from his own Word, and from his own Spirit, do we derive the most solemn assurances, confirmed even in many instances with oaths, that he has grace sufficient for our uttermost need, and mercy in store for the chief of sinners. Need we go farther than the precious passage which is at this moment under our eye? Its words are addressed to the wicked and the unrighteous of |