No act falls fruitless; none can tell
How vast its power may be,
Nor what results enfolded dwell
Within it silently.

Work on, despair not; bring thy mite,
Nor care how small it be;

God is with all who serve the right;
The holy, true, and free.

W. Gaskell.

Too long, O God, to sin we've turned
The talents Thou hast given;

Too long for earth, ungrateful, burned
The incense due to heaven.

Too long we've slighted precious hours
Which came with gifts divine;
Too long devoted noble powers
On folly's tinselled shrine.

Wake now within our souls, we pray,
A yearning deep and strong,
To wipe out more and more each day,
The self-inflicted wrong.

Y

May every thought and energy,
To this high end be true,

Till death without a fear we see,
And heaven with transport view.

[See Hymn 459, Martineau's Hymn Book.]

LESSON XXVII.

PRAYER-No. 1.

SENSE OF HELPLESSNESS AND WANT.

Martineau's "Strength of the Lonely." Discourse XV. in "Endeavours after the Christian Life."

WALTER went one day to town with his uncle Henry it was the day fixed upon for the opening of the new Town Hall. There were grand processions, with flags and music, and green and flowery arches, and many people assembled in the houses where the procession was to pass. The house where uncle Henry left Walter looked upon the Market Place, which was filled with people, who shouted as the different speakers appeared in the balcony to address them. It was a fine sight. Little Caroline, and some other children that Walter knew, and many whom he did not know were there; and when

they were tired of looking out of the windows they could amuse themselves within, playing together and looking at pictures.

At four o'clock, uncle Henry called again for Walter, (he had been away with the other people in the procession for some hours,) to take him home. Walter was very glad when he came, for he had been wanting to go home very much. He kept fast hold of uncle Henry's hand all the way, as if he were afraid of losing him again. He was very quiet and silent, and uncle Henry was silent too. He left him at the door of his home-he could not stop to go in with him. Walter found his mother sitting at work, in her rocking-chair; he threw himself in her lap, put his arms round her neck, and burst into tears. She put her arms about him, laid her cheek upon his head, and rocked him in her lap some little time without speaking. When he got a little calmer, she asked him what was the matter. 66 Oh, mother!" he answered, still sobbing, "nothing is the matter, now that I am with you again; but I was getting so miserable before uncle Henry came for me-I did so want you! it was so uncomfortable there all alone. I felt as if I did not know what I ought to do-as if I did not know any thing, and as if there were no one

to take care of me, or to help me-as if none of them thought or cared about me, or could understand what I was thinking or feeling. And oh, mother! one little boy was so cross, and said such unkind things about me-and nobody explained that it was not true. And I know I turned quite red, I was so angry; and you weren't there, mother, to help me to feel good again! Mother, I longed to beat and kick that boy-and I know if you had but been there, you would have made it all right; but nobody seemed to care! Oh! do keep with me, mother -always-I can't be alone again!"

The tears were in his mother's eyes as she kissed him-she seemed to want to say something but still she was silent, and only kissed him again and again, and pressed him closer in her arms. After a while, she said, "It is not little children only, Walter, who feel as you feel. Times will very likely come even when you are a man-quite grown up-when every thing will seem wearisome and worthless to you, even as the flags and the crowd in the marketplace did to-day; when you will feel that you know nothing and can do nothing-of yourself, and when it will seem as if there were no one to

care for you, or to help you. But there is some