ON TIME. the ruin of the religious enjoyment and usefulness of young members of the Church. But we must not enlarge. Let all beware of the snares of the devil. He desires to have you, that he may sift you as wheat." Beware of the Devil's sieve! Once in it, and you begin to deteriorate-your virtue leaves you at a rapid rate; and the great Sifter will, if possible, hold you fast, and shake you in his sieve until nothing is left of you but "chaff "-and then you will be burned with unquenchable fire."-The Christian Advocate and Journal. BLESSING. "And my prayer shall turn into my own bosom."-PSALM Xxxv. 13. WHO ever lost by giving? The sky pours down its rain, Go, rob the sparkling fountain, Who ever lost by loving? To pay our love with more. -New York Observer. ON TIME. BY OLD HUMPHREY.* FOR a brief season let us talk together of Time. Few subjects are more important, though hardly any occupy less of our thoughts. We do, now and then, it is true, indulge in an ejaculation, "How time flies!" and sagely advise others to "take time by the forelock," but rarely do we make time the healthy and profitable subject of our meditation. Were I to content myself with telling you that time is "the measure of duration," and that this measurement is made apparent to us by the revolutions of the heavenly bodies, by the changes of the seasons, and by the returns of day and night, as well as by human contrivances, such as hour-glasses, clocks, and watches,-you would perhaps think, and with great propriety, that I might very safely have given you credit for knowing all this quite as well as myself; but, as I do not mean to content myself with giving you this unnecessary information, I feel that I have some claim on your regard. It is much better to improve time than to be able to define it; and if I can impress your minds with the value of time, I may do something towards the attainment of this desirable object. Listen, then, to the words of Old Humphrey. Time-silent, stealthy, and unstaying Time--with From "Half Hours by Old Humphrey." 451 Time-rigid, pitiless, and implacable Time-as he moved on, held in his hand his scythe, which he seemed to have newly sharpened. The captive, who longed for liberty; and the swain and maiden betrothed in marriage; and the fundholder, who looked onwards to his dividends, urged him to increase his speed; but he would not. Others there were whose plans were not matured, whose money was not ready for the day of payment, and whose lives were nearly spent, who begged hard of Time, yea, besought him with tears for some delay; but he deigned not to notice them; his keen grey eye rested on his hour-glass, and the sands ran on. Time-aged, hard, and inaccessible Time-reclines on a sofa at the end of a ball-room, where Beauty leads the dance. Pleasure and joy live in her smile; the glance of her eye is felt from afar, and a thoughtless crowd flutter around to pay her homage. She is tastefully and splendidly arrayed; for riches are hers, and power, and this is a season of revelry and delight. Alas! even now her cheek is pale; the diamonds in her eyes are dim. A mortal stroke, to which all are liable, has suddenly palsied her frame; she is hurrying to eternity. A moment she revives. Time, she is faintly shrieking thy name! she has a neglected Bible to read; neglected poor relations to relieve; and she has to prepare for her latter end. Hark! she is raving for thee. Time seems not to hear; for, as she is carried away, he leisurely adjusts his hour-glass, and the sands run on. Time-selfish, severe, and immovable Time-sat at! his ease in a chamber, while a miser grappled with Death, whose summons to quit the world he declared himself willing to obey; but not then. The conflict was desperate; and almost had Death overpowered him, when the miser, as his last resource, turned to bribe Time to assist him. He offered him silver and gold; hundreds, nay thousands, for another year-ay. for another hour. Fool that he was, to suppose that golden and silver dust would be taken in payment for the sands of life. Time gave no answer to his appeal, but occupied himself with his hour-glass, and the sands ran on. Time-rigorous, ruthless, and resistless Time-lin gered in the precincts of a palace. A mighty monarch was drawing near his latter end, and an impor tant document affecting a kingdom's welfare was being drawn up for the royal signature; dominion hung on a spider's thread. The order of peaceful succession, and the anarchy of a contested throne, were suspended in the balance. Among men, "where the word of a king is, there is power." "But wealth and power, and courts and kings, With Time are very trifling things; No more they are, nor will they be, Than hubbles on the boundless sea." The expiring monarch, the princes of his court, and his physicians, were urgent and importunate with Time, for an hour was worth a diadem; but Time was deaf to their entreaties; he was busy with his hour-glass, and the sands ran on. Time-austere, callous, and insensible Time-had seated himself at night on the stump of an old tree, near a cottage. Alice was sober, honest, industrious, and cleanly; but, oh! it is fearful to be every thing for this world, and nothing for another. Alice had found no time for prayer, no time to read her Bible; and, when she wanted it, it was not to be had. A fire broke out; the flames caught Alice in her bed, and she was burned, dreadfully burned, before she was rescued. Then it was, when eternity appeared in view, that she entreated Time to let her read and pray; but princes and peasants, courts and cottages, are alike with Time. Alice's entreaties were disregarded; Time shifted his hour-glass, and the sands an on. Time hoary-headed, obdurate, and relentless Time-walked on the billowy beach. A vessel was about to sail to a distant land, having on board a broken-hearted father, whose abandoned son had forced him by his profligacy from the land of his birth. That son, repentant and reformed, was flying to throw himself at his father's feet, that he might bathe them with penitent tears. In another hour he would have arrived, and sorrow would have been turned into joy. Did Time grant him the space he required -only one little hour? Not he. The son came, but the father was gone for ever. Time heeded them not; he heeded his hour-glass only, and the sands ran on. Time-remorseless, inflexible, and flinty hearted Time-stood on a scaffold. The rope was around a culprit's neck, but as yet the cap was not pulled over ais face. The wretched man strained his eyes toward the distant road, for he expected a reprieve. As he gazed with agony, the clammy sweat hung about his brow, for in his excited imagination he aw at a distance a horseman urging on his flying steed, waving a handkerchief-the symbol of pardon -and flying as a saving angel to his rescue. He turned to Time, with all the fearful energy of one grappling for life. He begged, he prayed, he raved for a few minutes' delay-in vain! The cap was pulled over his distorted face; Time only looked on his hour-glass, and the sands ran on. Time-stern, unsparing, and inexorable Timeleaned against a bed post in a sick chamber. A backsliding reprobate had sinned away his season of grace; his mortal hour was come. The pangs of remorse were tearing him; the horrors of despair were gathering around him. He cried aloud that a space might be allowed him for repentance; a year, a month, a day, an hour, nay, only a quiet minute to put up one prayer-one cry for mercy-one breath Sin chuckled at the frightful scene, and Death smiled in derision, as Time, iron-hearted Time, turned his hour-glass, and the sands ran on. to And will Time tarry for neither youth, beauty, nor riches? Will he neither stand still for princes and peasants, nor allow a moment's respite to the dying reprobate? How, then, reader, canst thou ex pect him to deal more tenderly with thee? Trust him not, but improve thy flying moments with all thy power, so shalt thou survive the tyranny of Time. Turn thee from Time to the Eternal; for with the Lord" one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day."-(2 Pet. iii. 8.) Seek the mercy of Christ, like the dying thief on the cross; for the only opportunity may be the present. Adore his name, implore his grace, believe his gospel, obey his word, give him thy heart, and then— Though Time, exhausted Time, shall die- THE DIFFICULTY OF SALVATION. "If the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear ?"-] PETER iv, 18. THE apostle here speaketh, not of the uncertainty, but of the difficulty of salvation. If it be so hard for them to be saved that have passed the pikes, shot the gulf, and travelled a considerable part of their way heavenward; how hard will it be for them who art not yet set out, that have not hitherto taken one step in the way to life! The sleepy world dream indeed that men may g to heaven without so much ado-they look upon outward decency as sanctity, worldly sighs to be godly sorrow; and if they can but spare a little time now and then from the world and the flesh to mumble over a few night petitions, they hope with the hel; of these to get to heaven. Or if before their death they get a little warning, so that they can but cry. Lord! have mercy on us-or tell their neighbours that they are sorry for their sins, or get a minister to pray with them-then all must be well, and that when they die, they must as sure go to God and Christ as they lived to the flesh and the devil. But stay a little. Christ never would have commanded men to strive, as in an agony, to enter in at the strait gate, to work out their salvation with fear and trembling, to labour for the food that endureth to everlasting life, if it had been such an easy thing to have reached heaven. Things of such excellency are not obtained with such facility. They must travel far, dig deep. work hard, that will get at the golden mines. The way to hell lieth downhill, but it is hard to go uphill to Mount Zion. Friend, I write not these things to discourage, but to quicken thee to industry in that which is of such unspeakable concern to thy soul. And if thou dost take but a brief view of what things are wrought in a man when he comes to be saved, and how little he doth contribute to them, nay, how opposite he is to them, thou mayest perceive that salvation is not easy. Thy mind must be enlightened to see both sin and the Saviour. Now, is it easy to open the eyes of the blind? When Jesus gave sight to one that was born blind, the Jews themselves could not but acknowledge him a worker of miracles. What then will the scattering the mists of ignorance, and dispersing the clouds of darkness, which gather and thicken about our understandings by nature, speak the Sun of Righteousness to be? Thy heart also must be thoroughly humbled; stone must be turned into flesh. And oh! it is not easy to melt such hard metal, when thy heart naturally is like clay, hardened both by the sunshine of mercies and the fire of judgments, so that no change of weather can make that stone to weep. (Ezek. xxxvi. 26.) Besides, the strongholds of sin must be cast down; thy old friends must be deserted, and persecuted with MISSIONARY SACRIFICES. implacable hatred, as irreconcilable enemies; those beloved lusts which are as thy right hand, and have such large room in thy heart, must be cut off and parted from thee. Thy fondest sin-the Isaac of thy corruption, which is the child of thy warmest affection, in which thou hast taken such great delight, and from which thou hast promised thyself such large returns of profit, pleasure, or preferment, must be laid on the altar, and have the sacrificing knife thrust into the heart of it, and its blood poured out before the Lord. Now, is not this an hard saying? -who can hear it? Is it not a hard lesson ?-who can learn it? Dives and his dishes-Balaam and his wages-Herod and his Herodias-the young man and his great means, are not easily separated. In works of art it is hard to build, easy to destroy. In the works of nature, a tree which has been many years growing may be cut down in an hour. But in the works of sin it is otherwise; man's weakness may easily build them up, but God's power only can throw them down. Again, all thy earthly comforts, whether friends, relations, name, estate, limbs, life, must be laid at the feet of Christ, hated for his sake, and parted with at his call and command, and that for the hope of such things as thou never sawest, nor art ever likely to see while thou livest. Is not this hard-to forego an estate in hand for something only in hope --to throw away present possessions, and follow Christ, thou knowest not whither, to receive an inheritance thou knowest not when ! And as thy sins and thy soul must be parted asunder, so thy Saviour and thy soul must be joined together; faith must accompany repentance, thy own righteousness must be accounted as dross, the weight of thy soul and the burden of thy sins must be laid on the naked cross of Jesus Christ. Now, for thee, who art by nature so extremely in love with thyself, to loathe thyself; and for thee, notwithstanding thy discouragements from the numbers and nature of thy sins, the threatenings and curses of the law, the wrath and righteousness of God, to cling about and hang upon the Lord Jesus, and resolve, though he kill thee, yet thou wilt trust in him-surely this is not easy. Farther, and finally, all the commands of God must be heartily embraced, some whereof are as contrary to flesh and blood as fire is to water. Self, which is thy great idol, must be denied; the world, with all its pomp and pride, in comparison with Christ, refused; principalities and powers encountered and foiled, thine enemies foved, godliness owned, though much disgraced by others, truth followed close, though it threaten to dash out thy teeth with its heels, a buffeted Christ with his cross preferred before weighty crowns; things which reason cannot comprehend, believed, and which none ever obtained, laboured for. Friend, are these easy things? What thinkest thou? Add to all this, not only of thy weakness and inability to do these things, but also thy wickedness and contrariety to them. Thou art not only deprived of good, but all over depraved with evil. The imaginations of thy heart are evil, only evil, and that continually. "The hearts of the sons of men are fully set in them to do evil.” -(Eccles. viii. 11.) Observe how full that text is. Man is resolved to have his own way, though he have wrath, and death, and hell into the bargain! If thou wert only empty of God and grace, the work were more easy; but thou art an enemy to grace and godliness; thy carnal mind is not an enemy, for such a one may be reconciled-but it is in the abstract enmity against God. Now, be thine own judge, is it easy to cure a malady like this? And is not that man worse than mad who either delayeth 453 or dallieth about his salvation, upon the supposition that he can do it easily enough hereafter, when all this that I have written must be wrought in him ere he attain to salvation, and when he is not empty of, or an enemy to, but even enmity against, it all.Swinnock. JOY. NEVER doth a soul know what solid joy is till it gives itself up to the Author of its being, and feels itself become a hallowed and devoted thing, and can say, "My Beloved is mine, and I am his: I am content to be any thing for him, and care not for myself but that I may serve him." A person moulded into this temper would find pleasure in all the dispensations of Providence. Temporal enjoyments would have another relish when he should taste the Divine goodness in them, and consider them as tokens of love sent by his dearest Lord and Master; and chastisements would hereby lose their sting. The rod as well as the staff would comfort him: he would snatch a kiss from the hand that was smiting him, and gather sweetness from that severity.-Scougal. KINDNESS IN THE FAMILY. IF a man has the soul of benevolence in him, where should he more show it than at home; to whom should he more develop it than to the wife of his bosom, and the "olive plants " around his table? We never could have any fellowship with that sort of piety which fails to make home sweet and happy. It never could gain our confidence. In a very practical and pertinent sense, real charity always "begins at home." There it does its first works, and some of its best. There is a sort of piety, so called, which promises well in the distance, and has the best name farthest from home. A worse testimony than this for its genuineness need not be sought. God made the family; every element of beauty and fitness of order and sweetness, blending in its constitution, combine to evince his handiwork. He made it to be the nursery of the Church-the school of morals-the home of happiness and of piety. Let no Christian think that his home responsibilities are met, unless the family of which he forms a part bears this image, and answers these divinely-conceived ends. MISSIONARY SACRIFICES. WHEN the Rev. Mr V, of the Church Missionary Society, received his instructions before the Committee at the Church Missionary House, he manifested such a lively disposition, and expressed himself in so impressive and affecting a manner, that a gentleman present followed him out of the room, feeling desirous to obtain some information Have from him respecting his family. He asked, you a father living?" Mr V replied, "I have." "Is your mother also alive?" He answered, "Yes." "Have you any brothers and sisters?" The answer was, There are ten of us in the family." The next question was a very natural one: -"Did they give you up willingly? Mr V replied, he trusted that he could say they did, adding, "On the morning that I left home, we all met round the domestic altar. My father, in prayer, commended me to the guidance, and keeping, and blessing of our covenant Gol; and, when we arose from our knees, I believe that one sentiment pervaded every breast. I believe that one and all could say, We love you, our son, our brother, most tenderly; but we all love Jesus Christ far more, and are very thankful that one of our number is called to the high privilege of making known his unsearchable riches to the heathen."" When the Rev. Mr W, of the same Society, had fully determined to go forth as a missionary, he could not make up his mind to tell his aged father of what he was going to do, as he knew it would cost him so much to part with him. He did tell his sister, and he met with this reply: "My dear brother, I have often prayed the Lord of the harvest to raise up labourers, and to send them forth into his harvest; but I have never prayed, I never can pray, that he may send you." A short time before his departure, he put into the hand of the same friend to whom he had mentioned che words of his beloved sister, a letter, which he had just received from his father, in answer to the one in which he had made known to him, for the first time, his intention of going as a missionary to India. In the beginning of the letter were very strong expressions of affection, on the part of the father for his son, and then went on to say in these simple and touching terms, "If the Lord has need of you among the heathen, I dare not oppose your going forth among them, for I know what he has done for me. He gave his adorable Son, not merely to live for me, but to die, as an atonement for my sin." And he bade his son go forth, with a father's blessing on his head; declaring that, as long as he lived, he would not fail to supplicate the God of all grace to be with his child, and to prosper the work of his hands. A day or two before he sailed, in a letter dated Deal, we have this description of his departure from his father's house :-" Painful, most painful, it was, to tear myself away from my much-loved and very precious home. I could not bear the pain of leavetaking; so, rising early, I secretly withdrew." Through a half-open door, at the early dawn, the son stood gazing upon his aged father as he slept, and then quitted the house, undiscovered, as he trusted, by any member of his beloved family. But a faithful servant girl, who had been, as he says, in happy days gone by, a pupil in my Sunday school (and God had blessed my counsels to her), saw me, and she, poor girl, hung upon me like a sister, and would not be pacified without sobbing out her tender farewell. As to myself," he added, "my nerves, which have sometimes been braced up to immovable firmness, utterly gave way, and I wept as I had never wept before. But I have not lost my best friend. Our Master, faithful and true, who suffers me to draw nigh to him, apportions my strength to my day, and will not leave me nor forsake me, as I trust, till he has made me more than a conqueror through himself who loveth me." This devoted missionary never returned to his native land and to his happy home. His mortal remains lie buried beneath the burning sands of India. He died of jungle fever after ten days of severe suffering. The enemy of souls strove hard to shake his faith, but, for some hours previous to his departure, he was permitted to enjoy the sweetest peace of mind; and in the firm faith and hope of everlasting life, through the sole merits of his Redeemer, he entered into his rest. SABBATH OR SUNDAY? causes often produce great effects. The reasons why it is so called, are good reasons why it should not be. Why does one denomination call it First day, and never Sabbath? Is it not because they esteem every day alike? and avoid the term Sabbath, because there is a sacredness attached to the very name as used in the Bible? And is it not much for the same reason that another denomination are particular to call it the Lord's day, as some of them have said they will do any thing on that day which was lawful to do on any day? Others are as particular to call it Sunday: Not because it is the heathen name of the day on which they worshipped the sun; nor because they find it in the Bible; nor do I think that all who call it so, mean by it to do away the sacredness which is ever associated with the Scripture term Sabbath. But many are so attached to the term Sunday, that they make it ring in the ear full often. I think I have counted the word eighteen times in about one column in the newspapers, joined with school. I hope Sunday School Union" will, as the Society has been requested, and may easily do, change the term for "Sabbath School Union," My reasons are, "The 1. The term Sabbath is the term the Lord has chosen, and repeated scores of times, for the name of the day which he has commanded us to keep holy. Why depart from the word which the Lord has chosen? Did he not appoint the right word? and had he not a good reason for it? 2. The term Sabbath is significant. It means rest; and when applied to the day the Lord calls his own, it signifies holy rest; and no other terms in use is so significant of the design and spirit of the command. And no reader of the Bible can see or hear the word Sabbath, and avoid the impression of something koly, sacred, reverential; and are, in some degree, made involuntarily to stand in awe, lest they incur the displeasure of the Lawgiver. Hence, 3. The disuse of it, and the substitution of any other term by which to designate the day, tends to do away the sacredness, awe, and reverence attached to the term. It will be "as when one letteth out water;" it will wear a deeper channel. Infidelity and irreligion make advances by little and little; and no doubt the disuse of that sacred term has contributed something towards such unfavourable results. Why do Papists prefix saint, i. e. holy, to almost every thing peculiar to their system? Do they not know that terms of such significance will induce respect, awe, and reverence, in the minds of the people, and that without such sacred terms much of that reverence and awe would be done away, and that words of different and especially opposite import would render them ridiculous? And why do they affix the most opprobrious terms to Protestants, if not to bring a scandal upon their character? I know that words are little things; but often mean a great deal, and as often have great effects. Let the sacred, the significant term Sabbath, which God has given to his day, be brought back, be spoken and written always, with all its sacred associations, as in past ages, and it will result only in good. WHY call the first day of the week Sunday? Little Pastore. A NEW CHURCH. THE DEATH OF THE YOUNG-ITS LESSON OF IMMORTALITY. THERE are some lessons peculiar to itself, connected probably with every death. As it differs from other instances of the same class in respect of the sickness by which it has been preceded, or of the age and the circumstances of the person who has been its subject, or of the quality and relations of the life it has closed, or of the spiritual experiences which have directly attended it-so it teaches a lesson peculiar to itself. There is no other so manyvoiced teacher on the earth as death. And there is no other who speaks so impartially to every class among men. The death of the young has always this lesson, for every heart-the reality of the future, and its superiority to the present. The seemingly gradual and progressive extinction of a life that has been protracted through many years, does not suggest this so forcibly. But when the young die-the little child that has just learned to prattle of God, to nestle into its mother's bosom and ask her about heaven; the active and thoughtful lad, or the sprightly girl; esecially the youth or the maiden who is just enterng on the activities of life and its intelligent enjoyment, and who has been fitted by assiduous culture of all native advantages for a long and beautiful ourse of beneficent Christian exertion-when such Je, it is impossible not to feel that the life has not nded. It has passed from our sight; but we know t is not closed. It is a conviction which forces self upon us-a conviction which argument is owerless to resist and is not needed to impress, a onviction before which infidelity must be dumbhat the course commenced continues still; that the pitt, so vital and full of force, has not at all been xtinguished; that the life which had but just unoided its blossoms and struck its roots into the ground of being, is springing under other skies into nobler and more symmetric growth; that the star which for a moment came radiantly to view, and then swept out from the reach of our eye, is still ursuing through other realms its luminous way. Not to feel this, would be practically to deny either the wisdom or the goodness of the Creator and Sovereign. It will be felt, after the first great agony is over, by every thoughtful and pious heart which trusts in God and opens itself to his teachings. And the conviction of it will come to such a heart with inessages of peace. It will bring heaven and Christ, and the myriads of the angels, nearer the thoughts. It will seem to ally the little family group with the great company of spirits. There will be heard a sweet celestial voice in the solitude of the soul-a voice only the sweeter, because recalling one that is to be heard on earth never again until the resurrec tion-singing faintly, but clearly from afar-" Dead, but through Christ alive again! "Not lost, but gone before! " There is almost no other event that jars so harshly at first upon our finest sensibilities, that comes against the soul with so violent a shock, as the death of a child or of a beautiful youth. But there is almost none either which, rightly considered, will open before the thoughts such a wealth of promise; such an assurance of immortality.—Independent. HARVEST HÝMN. GOD of the year! with songs of praise, And hearts of love, we come to bless Thy bounteous hand, for Thou hast shed Thy manna o'er our wilderness; In early spring-time thou didst fling O'er earth its robes of blossomingAnd its sweet treasures, day by day, Rose quick'ning in Thy blessed ray. And now they whiten hill and vale, And hang from every vine and tree, Whose pensile branches bending low, Seem bow'd in thankfulness to TheeThe earth, with all its purple isles, Is answering to Thy genial smiles, And gales of perfume breathe along, And lift to Thee their voiceless song. God of the seasons! Thou hast blest To crown the sweet autumnal hours: 455 -Mrs Sigourney. A NEW CHURCH. [THE Rev. Dr Archibald Alexander of Princeton, in recently addressing the inhabitants of Southwark, Philadelphia, at the laying of the corner-stone of a Presbyterian church, improved the occasion as follows:-] "It is, as it were, bringing God to dwell among you and to bless you. We all know that Jehovah dwelleth not in temples made with hands. And as Solomon said in his prayer at the dedication of the temple, 'But will God, indeed, dwell on the earth? Behold the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have builded.' God is not confined to any place; no, not even to the highest heavens; yet he does condescend to take up his abode in particular places. For after Solomon had ended his prayer, the glory of the Lord filled the house, and resided there in the inmost, or Most Holy Place; which glorious presence, or indwelling, the Jews called Schechina. This was a miraculous manifestation, and we look for nothing of the kind now; but there is a presence or indwelling, a spiritual Schechina, which is still more glorious and more beneficial; and that is in his Church in all ages: Where two or three are gathered together in my name,' says Christ,' there am I in the midst of them." Certainly then, where a Church of true believers meet for his worship, there is He-their Head. The most important society in the world is the Church, and it is a high privilege to have a branch of it established in our midst, to which we and our children can have free access. For wherever there is a Church of Christ, there Christ will be present; and he never comes to any place without bringing a blessing with Him: In all places where I record my name, I will come unto them, and I will bless them.' This is a promise of a general nature, not confined to any one time or dispensation. Wherever then, a Church is organized, |