of others that God may be truly worshipped, our conscientious toleration of other peoples' the Quakers consider as an important and sub- intolerance. lime part of their church service, and as possessing advantages which are not to be found in the worship which proceeds solely through the medium of the mouth.

For in the first place it must be obvious that, in these silent meetings, men cannot become chargeable before God, either with hypocrisy or falsehood, by pretending to worship him with their lips, when their affections are far from him, or by uttering a language that is inconhim, or by uttering a language that is inconsistent with the feelings of the heart.

From "Reason in Religion."

THE REVELATION OF THE SPIRIT.

BY FREDERIC HENRY HEDGE.

(Continued from page 20.)

The Spirit is not only light to the understanding: it is also motive and guide to the will. Its agency affects not only the knowledge but the practice of the truth. By it we are filled with holy aspirations, and moved to good deeds. All goodness is from God, just as all power is reIt must be obvious, again, that every man's motely or directly referrible to him. This divine influence is not incompatible with human devotion, in these silent meetings, is made, as freedom. Every act of goodness is still an act it ought to be, to depend upon himself; for no of the will. Omnipotence itself will not enforce man can work out the salvation of another for obedience. Nevertheless, it is God who worketh him. A man does not depend at these times in us, both to will and to do. From him we on the words of a minister, or of any other per- derive the capacity and the impulse. But cason present; but his own soul, worked upon by the divine influence, pleads in silence with the coercion. We are moved, and yet move freely; the divine influence, pleads in silence with the pacity is not necessity, and impulse is not Almighty its own cause. And thus, by extend- we accept the divine influence, yoke it with our ing this idea to the congregation at large, we destiny, and choose that the Spirit of God shall shall find a number of individuals offering up reign in our wills. Liberty is not absolute disat the same time their own several confessions; engagement from all rule. It does not consist in pouring out their own several petitions; giv lawless roving, but in free consent with legitiing their own thanks severally, or praising and mate sway, in free co-operation with the Suadoring; all of them in different languages, preme Will. Some rule we must obey; but we adapted to their several conditions, and yet may or may not elect cur ruler. Two opposite not interrupting one another.

currents of influence traverse the world. The one

leads Godward; the other, death ward. To move with the former is moral freedom; to be carried with the other is contradiction and bondage. To say that God is the author of our goodness, no more detracts from the power of the human will, than to say that God is the author of truth, detracts from man's intellectual powers. He acts upon us not a compulsory force, but as quickening influence.

Nor is it the least reccommendation of this worship, in the opinion of the Quakers, that, being thus wholly spiritual, it is out of the power of the natural man to obstruct it. No man can break the chain that thus binds the spirit of man to the spirit of God; for this chain, which is spiritual, is invisible. But this is not the case, the Quakers say, with any oral worship. "For how, says Barclay, alluding to his own times, can the Papists say their mass, The operation of the spirit is not always a diif there be any there to disturb and interrupt rect action on the individual mind. More frethem? Do but take away the mass book, the quently it acts through the instrumentality of chalice, the host, or the priest's garments; other subordinate agents,-through the lips and yea, do but spill the water, or the wine, or blow lives of men, by teachers and books, by instrucout the candles, (a thing quickly to be done,) tion and example, by institutions and ordinances, and the whole business is marred, and no sac- by every influence which moves the soul to rifice can be offered. Take from the Lutherans well-doing. When we read a book, and are and Episcopalians their liturgy or common profited by it; when we listen to a discourse that prayer-book, and no service can be said. Re-acts favorably on our moral nature, that awakens move from the Calvinists, Arminians, Socinians, Independents, or Anabaptists, the pulpit, the bible, and the hour-glass, or make but such a noise as the voice of the preacher cannot be heard, or disturb him but so before he come, or strip him of his bible or his books, and he must be dumb: for they all think it an heresy to wait to speak, as the Spirit of God giveth utterance; and thus easily their whole worship may be marred."

good impulses in the breast,-we are visited and moved by the Holy Ghost. The Church, and every institution established for moral and religious ends, so long as it fulfils its original design, is a medium of this influence. It is the Holy Spirit made concrete.

But, though this indirect operation is the more usual mode in which the divine influence is communicated, it acts also without the intervention of any visible agent: it acts as direct inspiration. There are motions of the Spirit in us which are not to be ascribed to any external The only true spirit of tolerance consists in influence; they are the Spirit of God acting oa

(To be continued.)

the instinct of goodness in the soul. There is this instinct in every soul. It is not the most patent, but the deepest of all our instincts. Often neutralized by other propensities, it needs the quickening of the spirit to give it life. Then it manifests itself in those moral aspirations by which the most thoughtless are sometimes roused to conscientious and beneficent action. If ever, at some moment of solitary musing, we have felt within ourselves a stronger conviction of moral and spiritual truth, a stronger determination to good; if ever we have seized with true insight the meaning and purpose of our being, and have formed the resolution to live for duty and for God,-it was the spirit breathing on the latent spark of spiritual life in the breast, which gave us that vision, and caused those fires to glow. And, if we analyse our experience at such seasons, we shall see how man's free agency may consist with divine impulsion. We shall see that while the determination of the mind to moral ends is a free determination, calling into action the whole force of our own will, it is still a divine impulse that moves us, and a God that works in us to will as well as to do.

The agency of the spirit, as now defined, is impartial in itself considered; but its efficacy in each individual is limited by personal conditions. It is limited by the receptivity which we bring to it; and the receptivity which we bring to it will depend in a great degree on previous training. I do not deny original indifferences of moral endowment. Some men seem born to goodness as a natural heritage: it is their patrimony. Their way apparently is smooth and free. No obstacle seems to intervene between the purposes they form and the ends they contemplate. The intent and the act hang together by natural dependence like the links of a chain. We admire the facility with which they appear to glide onward to perfection, while we are constantly thwarted and pulled back by inward contradiction or external force. Something of this difference may be due to natural inequality of moral constitution; but more is due to self-discipline. If the spirit of God has greater influence with some than others, the reason is generally, that, by early obedience and long discipline, they have attained to higher degrees of spiritual life. Their previous habits have disposed the mind to be easily affected by such influences; the will has not been perverted and depraved; the first impulses of the spirit in them were not resisted, but received into willing minds, and suffered to acquire a permanent control of the thoughts and actions. In nothing is the truth of the saying, that " to him who hath shall be given," more evident than it is in relation to the moral life. Therefore, said an apostle, "Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God." By a figure derived from human affec

tions, the divine agency is represented as a friend who wills our good, but may be vexed and alienated by our opposition or our indifference. Not that we can actually change the purpose of God, or avert his grace. Nothing that we can do can alienate his love, or render the Father of spirits less willing to aid and bless. He is true to us, however we may turn from him. Nevertheless, we may destroy the efficacy of his gifts in us; and, by alienating our own minds, may virtually alienate his love. The effect for us is the same, whether he is turned from us or we from him.

There is a very remarkable coincidence between this apostolic precept and the doctrine of some of the ancient Gentile philosophers. Gentile philosophy taught, that a good spirit waits upon all who choose to accept its guidance.

The great Athenian personified in this way the nobler instincts of his mind. He spoke of a deamon (or, as we shall say, a good genius) who informed and impelled him. And Seneca, the contemporary of Paul, says more explicitly, as if he had received the thought directly from him, "There dwells in us a Holy Spirit, which watches all our good and all our evil deeds, and who treats us according to the treatment he receives."

Subjectively, then, the Holy Spirit is to be considered a divine instinct in man; a special faculty, differing from reason and understanding, and the other faculties of the mind, in this, that it always speaks with authority; it addresses us, not as argument, but as command. So it appears in numerous instances in the history of the Apostles, who are represented as urged and impelled by this divine instinct to do, or to refrain from doing, sometimes contrary to their own judgment or their own will. Paul and Timothy, it is said, "assayed to go into Bithynia; but the Spirit would not suffer them." It was reserved for Protestantism, in harmony with its true, original tendency, to follow out these hints, and unfold this subjective side, as the elder church had developed the positive theological view of the Holy Ghost. Honor to George Fox and the founders of the sect of Friends, who first did justice to the Christian idea of divine inspiration; who re affirmed the spiritual instinct, and vindicated the inward light. What to the elder church was a barren dogma, a scholastic abstraction, and hypothesis, the third person in Trinity, to them was a spiritual fact. "When the Lord God and his Son Jesus Christ," says Fox," sent me forth into the world to preach bis everlasting gospel and kingdom, I was commanded to turn men to that inward light, spirit and grace, by which all might know the way to God; even that divine Spirit which would lead into all truth and would never deceive." His theory, and that of his followers, was, and is, that man, if he will, may have the

immediate guidance of the Spirit of God; that inspiration is not a past fact, but a present reality.

(To be continued.)

A LITTLE AT A TIME.

Wake, 'ere the earth born charm unnerve thee quite,
Do something-do it soon-do it with all thy might;
And be thy thoughts to work divine addressed;

An angel's wing would droop, if long at rest,
And God himself, inactive, were no longer blest."
-Central Presbyterian.

From Meditations on Death and Eternity.

A FORETASTE OF HEAVEN.

Dr. Johnson used to say, "He who waits to do a great deal of good at once, will never do any." Grand occasions of life seldom come, Yea, I know it, I believe it, and I feel it: I are soon gone, and when present, it is only one among thousands who is adequate to the great destinies of my fellow-creatures, in all the splensee it in every event of my life, in the various actions they demand. But there are opportu- did works of nature-that sublime and eternal nities at our doors every day, in which the temple of God-that the all-loving Father has "small sweet charities of life" may occupy us created us children of the earth for perfect hapfully. What account can we give of these as piness, that we may already here below enjoy a they pass by and on to eternity, to lay their re- foretaste of Heavenly bliss; but that the source cord before the great throne? He who flatters of our delights, as the source of our pains, is himself with air-castles, constructed out of mag-in our own bosoms,-springs from our virtues nificent schemes he would accomplish, were he or our vices. endowed with great wealth or exalted to high stations, will soon find them dissolving into thin air, whenever he calls his heart to an honest account for the right use of that which God has already entrusted to his care. "He that is unfaithful in that which is least, is also unfaithful in much."

Human life is made up of a succession of little things, or such as are commonly, though mistakenly, so considered. They mould our character and give complexion to our eternity; can they be insignificant? How slow are we in learning to do" whatsoever our hand findeth," and to leave the results, great or small, at the disposal of him who has declared" whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only, in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you he shall in no wise lose his reward."

Then, Christian disciple, "In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thy hand." "Blessed are they that sow beside all waters." Look around in your neighborhood, in your church, and you can be at no loss for important work to do. Be content to attend to duties as they arise; take them as they are sent by providence. Every moment brings its own responsibilities, and man's wisdom in this world of sin, of sorrow, and of death, consists in cheerfully using present comforts, and diligently attending to present duties. Let the crumbs, the fragments of time, be gathered up, that nothing be lost. Forget not that, all the world over, great things are made up of a vast multitude of those which are little. Eternity is composed of moments of time, never ceasing. Nothing will more certainly find the slothful at last, or bring them to a dreadful reckoning, than wasted time.

"Wake, thou that sleepest in enchanted bowers,
Lest these lost years should haunt thee in the
night,

When death is waiting for thy numbered hours,
To take their swift and everlasting flight;

feel whose heart has not one thing to upbraid How unutterably happy must that man him with, in respect to any of his relations in life; who does not permit his mind to be unduly disturbed by cares of any kind; who does not allow either unbridled anger, or unrestrained affection, to lead him into any excess! In him dwells a sublime calm, of which ordinary men can hardly form a conception,-that calm which is the true peace of God.

alone amid the new-born beauties of nature? Have you ever passed a fine spring morning When, at such a time, you have been roving in the shade of peaceful groves, through the green canopy of which the rosy waves of sunlight broke; when the soft breath of morn was wafted across the verdant landscape, and the numberless flowerets shivered, and the dew on the leaflets glittered in the tears of joy, which Heaven had shed at the Holiness and Goodness of the Creator; and the cascade leaping from the rock, and the river in its bed, and the forest on the hill, sent forth solemn murmurs; while high up above, and deep down below, the air resounded with the wonderful song of birds, and the buzzing of insects-oh, what were your feelings? Did not a sense of inexpressible delight flash through your bosom? You drew a deep breath; your body seemed etherealized; you felt as if you must join your voice to the voices of the air, as if you must mix your tears with the tears of heaven; you longed for the wings of rosy morn to soar up high into the empyrean, or to sink into the green depths of the forests, or to lose yourself

in the blue haze that veiled the unknown distance. You longed to pour your love through the entire world.

Did you ever lie down on the top of a mounits fields and cottages spread in silent repose tain, whence you beheld a wide landscape with before your eyes? In your bosom also perfect quiet reigned! You forgot all your domestic

FRIENDS' INTELLIGENCER.

cares; no sorrow weighed on your spirits, no | make some unpleasant remembrance disturbed the benefi- that recognition of long oppressed innocence cent calm, no passion dared to intrude to break made your heart swell with emotion; how a quiet amends? Do you recollect how the holy peace of your soul, and a voice within joy took possession of you, as though it was whispered, "Blessed were I, could I forever remain thus!" What you then felt was a fleeting how the happiness of that virtue which had at foretaste of Heaven, which sometimes even length received its reward, called tears of silent your own innocence that had been vindicated; passionate, unquiet spirits are allowed to enjoy, satisfaction into your eyes? On that occasion, in order that they may look into themselves, and you shared in spirit, with the person whose earnestly reflect how they might perpetuate innocence was made manifest, a foretaste of this tranquil and blessed state. then felt was the peace of God, which the virings that sprang the joy you experienced. It What you Heaven. It was from your own virtuous feeltuous and wise, which the true followers of was the germs of true happiness within Christ experience even in the midst of the were moved; it was the source of your eternal greatest tribulation, above it. You were happy in the moments choke up this spring with the rubbish of lower and which raises them welfare that began to flow. Ah! why did you you that alluded to, because you learnt then to forget desires and petty cares? Why did you not yourselves, because you were free from the put forth your full strength to rise in future mundane desires, which regained possession of above all low tendencies, and make a resolve to you as soon as you re entered your homes. But remain forever the elevated being you were woe to him who, in order thoroughly to enjoy during those brief moments of emotion? life, must learn to forget himself! This is a proof, either that his heart is burdened with the consciousness of many sins, or that it is oppressed with cares and unsatisfied wants, springing from his vanity, his frivolity, his covetousness, or other impure tendencies; or that when he acts he does not act wisely, and that what he possesses he does not possess with wisdom; but that he allows himself to be consumed by a thousand vain and petty cares, and creates for himself sorrows which he will event-kindled by the smile of her child standing ually discover to have been unnecessary.

age

hours of paradise. But at a later Childhood has its Eden. Adolesence has its behold from time to time a ray, as if from a better world, flashing across our path, and lighting up the common place things around also we

us.

Providence sends to poor mortals, to stimulate them to strive after that which can alone renThese are foretastes of Heaven, which der lasting such blissful moments.

Hast thou known the feelings of a mother

The true disciple never needs to forget him- and grace, when in silent but holy love she before her in the fresh bloom of its loveliness self in order to be cheerful in his very inner- bends over this angel of her life, and seems most soul. On the contrary, it is when he with her kisses to draw its pure soul over into examines his inward being, and his relations to her own? Hast thou known the delight of a the Father of all life, that he feels most happy. father, when he beholds for the first time the The present day may have its storms, but the new-born babe that owes its existence to him? future only smiles the more brightly to him.- when the infant smiles upon him for the first He is with God, and God is with him. Wheth-time? when the joyous child lisps its first word? er he be of high or humble station, rich or poor, praised or blamed, to him it is all the same; for the source of his happiness is not in the outward world, but within himself. And he is with God, and God is with him. And "blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God," here already, in their foretaste of the higher bliss of Heaven.

Almost every stage of human life has its heavenly moments, in which mortal man feels himself, as it were, involuntarily raised above himself. Not what we possess or what we earn, not what we eat and drink, not our apparel, not what men think of us, but a pure heart, is the true source of happiness.

Have you witnessed, or have you read of how persecuted innocence has been rescued? how some meritorious benevolent man was long misjudged, and overwhelmed with accusations by his enemies, until at length the world learnt to see its own injustice, and every one sought to

when he sees it growing in health, industry, and virtue? Ah! the delights of those heavenly moments he would not exchange for all the treasures of the world! and the mother too feels this most deeply, and says, "Take all else from me, and I am nevertheless blessed!" Queens may be inexpressibly miserable, and beggarwomen unutterably happy!

SO

chords of the heart. Alas! why do we
often leave then untouched? What is it that
Such feelings are vibrations of the purest
draws us all so irresistibly towards the sweet
world of childhood? What is the hidden
power which, at the sight of an infant, moves
the stranger's heart? It is the guileless trust,
the sweet innocence, the winning grace of
even the barbarian, and which wins at once
childhood, that charms us.
purity of the angelic nature; it is the vague an-
ticipation of a brilliant future for the child, and
of how deservedly-should these young beings
It is the spotless

it enjoys more, also profits more in its pursuit.

One method among others which might be named, for interesting a family in vigorous and profitable reading, is that of a pleasant family reading circle, where new books, and all important reading shall be mutually enjoyed, criticized, and canvassed-different members taking part in reading aloud. Many an otherwise-prosy work, which in solitary reading would soon be laid aside with a yawn of weariness and disgust, becomes eloquent with thought and brimming with interest by a perusal under such circumstances.

preserve their purity and their virtues in a later pursue, an opposite course. For from that age-they will become objects of the world's which the mind loves and is attracted towards, devotion. We honour in the child the undese-it experiences a stronger influence, and while crated sanctuary of the heart, which as yet has no presentiment of evil. It is not the outward form, it is not flesh and blood, that excites our love and admiration; but the purity, the something Divine that speaks to us from the frank and open eye, the ingenuous countenance of the child. It is our own inborn sense of virtue, which, unconsciously to ourselves, animates us at such moments. In intercourse with the innocent little ones, we ourselves become more innocent, more noble and more wise; we are ashamed to appear before them in all our imperfections; and he who has not the courage to conquer his faults at least tries to conceal them. Verily, we may frequently learn more, improve more in wisdom and goodness, in the society of children, than in intercourse with the wisest of our acquaintance. "Suffer little children to come unto me," said Jesus; " for of such is the kingdom of Heaven.'

(To be continued.)

SOCIAL READING IN THE HOME CIRCLE.

This is a reading age. It is an age of "steam" in book-making as well as in other arts. There is no one who can read, but can find something cheap enough or weak enough costly enough or strong enough, to suit the purse or the taste.

How shall we guard our children and household circles from too much story-reading, and induce them, cheerfully and voluntarily, to select for their principal reading the substantial and profitable in our literature-that which will give them mental and moral sinew, muscle and bone?

We can require them to read certain books, and forbid them the perusal of others, but this is not the whole of the desired end to be sought.

Many facts might be adduced to prove that even a compulsory course of vigorous reading is far preferable to none. Thoughts do thus find lodgment in the mind, and eventually bear good

Memory sometimes, in its office of gleaner, gathers up thus, precious treasures from the past, while conscience whispers of the time when these mental treasures were rudely thrust from the mind, and their perusal endured with many a frown and restless shrug, as almost in

tolerable tasks.

But it were better far if our dear home circles could have such direction given their tastes, as to lead them to seek and love substantial aliment for their hungering minds.

A book, or a course of reading with which the social life of a household circle has been blended, will live in the reminiscences of after years, glowing with home, intellect and affection, as well as with the direct iustruction of the printed pages. Its truths shall have the sanction of the dear parents who listened, explained too, and presided over the social group, and silent whispers shall remind the scul of their interest or delight, their admonitions or encouragements in these reading hours, long after the books have become old and time-worn, and those parents have gone from the scenes of earth.

One word here respecting that much-to-be coveted accomplishment--good reading. Would that it commanded far more consideration in family and school culture. Have we not all experienced the power of the effective and accomplished reader, in listening to the reading of the Scriptures, when a formerly obscure passage suddenly becomes clear to us, and luminous with the truth it expresses by the emphasis and inflection of some beautiful reader?

We can hardly expect our children to become perfect in this branch of culture, but we can secure for them very much more cultivation in the home-circle, and do far more to compensate for the deprivation of extensive advantages than we are apt to suppose.

Sound reading in the family, with free, kind criticisms from its different members, with a hearty sympathy in the spirit of the matter read, will do much towards forming accomplished readers Attentive listening to good public elocutionists will prove a help to the self-cultivated reader. It is wonderful with what an interest any such art will inspire a family, when they mutually pursue it.

Trying to catch and give the delicate shades of meaning of various authors, endeavoring to modulate and cultivate the voice to varied and It requires tact and wisdom, when the influ- expressive tones, and to read so as to command ences set so strongly upon young minds towards attention and give pleasure, will afford an ina diluted and purely entertaining kind of read-spiring and laudable emulation to any domestic ing, to bring them to desire, or cordially to group.