ment of the Lord Jesus Christ. Indeed without this (I would speak with reverence) we cannot discern how God could be just, and yet be favourable to man. His law being broken, justice required satisfaction. Man could not possibly answer its requisitions, and therefore must have perished under an eternal weight of guilt. But the Son of God, by the assumption of our nature, rendered himself capable of suffering as a vicarious sacrifice, whilst the dignity of his person gave worth and efficacy to the atonement. Hence justice being satisfied, and the demands of the law fully assured; through the poverty of the God-man Jesus, every believer is enriched with the blessings of grace here, and of glory in the world to come. And oh! how far do these riches exceed what this world can possibly boast. The one is mean and sublunary, the other supreme and durable. Supreme, as emanating from the fulness of God; and durable, for it fadeth not away; yea, its perpetuity can only be measured by the eternity of Jehovah.

Seeing we are to be partakers of these privileges, through this astonishing way, is it not material to inquire into the primary cause of this important transaction, and its attendant blessings? From the text then we proceed—

III. To shew that all is done of grace. "For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ."

Grace, when used in relation to God, intends free and unmerited favour, or kind exertions of Deity, merely from his own good pleasure. In this sense, the Apostle uses it here: and that it does flow through this channel might, if necessary, be easily demonstrated.

1st. From God's indépendance. For he being pre-existent to and the Former of all things, all his creatures must necessarily be in subjection unto him; consequently all his transactions, whether of comparatively small or great importance, depend on his sovereign will: and surely then all this, which bears the testimony of goodwill as on its front, must be the effect alone of his sovereign grace; for what claim could creatures make on God, or what demands had they on his favour? He might have glorified his justice in the destruction of Adam, and every one of his children-but "he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy." 2ndly. Repeated Scripture testimony demonstrates, that all our enjoyments flow from the free pleasure of God. Eph. ii. 10. “ grace are ye saved, through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;" and Titus iii. 4. "According to his mercy he saveth us, by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost, which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; that being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

By

3rdly, Christian experience. 'Tis said, "All thy children shall be taught of God ;" and all who are God's people are by his Spirit

taught this lesson, that their salvation is of grace alone. To admit any thing beside as a co-partner with Jesus, is derogatory to his honor, and inimical to the truth of God. Indeed, till a man is brought to cast himself as a poor helpless destitute sinner, upon the mercy and grace of God, through Jesus Christ, the Scriptures give us no warrant to say that man's condition is safe: but on the contrary, those who are brought to an entire submission to the mode of free salvation, as revealed in the Gospel of Christ, and who evidence the reality of their dependance by the sincerity and universality of their obedience, of them it may be said, "Happy is the people who are in such a case, yea happy is the people whose God is the Lord."

VII.-The Penny Magazine on Education.

It is our intention to return again to this most important little periodical, but at present we notice it only for the sake of the answer it gives to the question:-What is education? The Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, of which it is the organ, has been gradually changing its tone, as it felt itself driven by the course of events to the inevitable necessity of making religion the foundation of any great national improvement. It has raised a spirit, which the ordinary spells cannot lay, and which bids defiance to all the expedients of political wisdom, and worldly experience. The men who composed it, had liberal and enlightened minds, and their motives, we believe, were at bottom benevolent : but they were not men of piety. They had forgotten the lesson of our Lord, or perhaps despised it as too simple, "Make the tree good, and his fruit good."

Now, however, they are convinced of its wisdom, and have come forward with the public 'announcement, that all true reformation must begin from within, and take chief cognizance of the heart and conduct. It is true, they talk of a mistaken notion of the term "useful," but it is a mistake which their own publications have done much to countenance; and it is also true, that they mention religion with evident reluctance, disguising it under the absurd name of a general education, and endeavouring still more unwisely to separate between moral and religious instruction; as if religion did not contain the purest and the only influential morality: nevertheless all this only makes the acknowledgment the more valuable, that the first place in every system of national education is due to that which teaches a man his duty to God, and to his neighbour. The following is the passage referred to—

"This may seem a very simple question, and very easily answered; but many who think so, would really be very much at a loss to answer it correctly. Every man, in a free country, wants three sorts of education :-one, to fit him for his own particular trade or calling,-this is professional educa tion;-another to teach him his duties as a man and a citizen,—this is moral

and political education ;-and a third, to fit him for his higher relations, as God's creature, designed for immortality,-this is religious education. Now, in point of fact, that is most useful to a man which tends most to his happiness; a thing so plain, that it seems foolish to state it. Yet people constantly take the word "useful" in another sense, and mean by it, not what tends most to a man's happiness, but what tends most to get money for him; and therefore they call professional education a very useful thing: but the time which is spent in general education, whether moral or religious, they are apt to grudge as thrown away, especially if it interferes with the other education, to which they confine the name of "useful;" that is, the education which enables a man to gain his livelihood. Yet we might all be excellent in our several trades and professions, and still be very ignorant, very miserable, and very wicked. We might do pretty well just while we were at work on our business; but no man is at work always. There is a time which we spend with our families; a time which we spend with our friends and neighbours; and a very important time which we spend with ourselves. If we know not how to pass these times well, we are very contemptible and worthless men, though we may be very excellent lawyers, surgeons, chemists, engineers, mechanics, labourers, or whatever else may be our particular employment. Now, what enables us to pass these times well, and our times of business also, is not our professional education, but our general one. It is the education which all need equally-namely, that which teaches a man, in the first place, his duty to God and his neighbour; which trains him to good principles and good temper; to think of others, and not only of himself. It is that education which teaches him, in the next place, his duties as a citizen-to obey the laws always, but to try to get them made as perfect as possible; to understand that a good and just government cannot consult the interests of one particular class or calling, in preference to another, but must see what is for the good of the whole; that every interest, and every order of men, must give and take; and that if each were to insist upon having everything its own way, there would be nothing but the wildest confusion, or the merest tyranny. And because a great part of all that goes wrong in public or private life arises from ignorance and bad reasoning, all that teaches us in the third place, to reason justly, and puts us on our guard against the common tricks of unfair writers and talkers, or the confusions of such as are puzzle-headed, is a most valuable part of a man's education, and one of which he will find the benefit whenever he has occasion to open his mouth to speak, or his ears to hear. And, finally, all that makes a man's mind more active, and the ideas which enter it nobler and more beautiful, is a great addition to his happiness whenever he is alone, and to the pleasure which others derive from his company when he is in society. Therefore, it is most useful to learn to love and understand what is beautiful, whether in the works of God, or in those of man; whether in the flowers and fields, and rocks and woods, and rivers, and sea and sky; or in fine buildings, or fine pictures, or fine music; and in the noble thoughts and glorious images of poetry. This is the education which will make a man and a people good, and wise, and happy. Give this,-and the ends of professional education can never be altogether lost; for good sense and good principle will ensure a man's knowing his particular business; but knowledge of his business, on the other hand, will not ensure them; and not only are sense and goodness the rarest and most profitable qualities with which any man can enter upon life now, but they are articles of which there never can be a glut: no competition or over-production will lessen their value; but the more of them that we can succeed in manufacturing, so much the higher will be their price, because there will be more to understand and to love them."

VIII.-The Reformer on the Polygamy of the Coolin Brahmuns.

The editorial remarks of the Reformer of the 11th February last, on the Polygamy of the Coolins, with one or two slight exceptions, afforded us unfeigned pleasure. We regard them as alike honourable to the head and heart of the writer, and intend accordingly to do them all the justice we can by re-publishing them entire. We wish our readers to be aroused to an adequate sense of their duty towards the vast but wretched community that surrounds them. And if all of them cannot join us in laying the reforming axe to the root of the great "Upas tree" of superstition and idolatry, that overshadows and blights the otherwise fair surface of this land, we wish them to seize at least the pruning knife, and prove helpful in lopping off some of the most pestiferous of the branches. That a practice so utterly unnatural as that of a wholesale polygamy, for the sake of filthy lucre-a practice so contrary to the dictates of sound reason, so abhorrent to the genuine feelings of humanity, and so subversive of the best interests of society, should have prevailed so widely and so long, may well fill us with sorrow, though it cannot excite our astonishment. It is the direct, legitimate result of Pouranic Hindooism—that hideous system, so fraught with the fatal power of excluding all good, and concentrating all evil. From the blind votaries of such a system, what could we expect, but excesses, growing apace into absolute monstrosities? And if left to themselves, how could we reasonably expect corruption to issue in life, or extinguished vision in the effulgence of sunshine? The apparent apathy of the Christian public, on the other hand, may be fairly attributed to their general inacquaintance with the subject. The Suttee atrocity they well knew, and therefore, year after year, they wrote against it in pamphlets and periodicals, and denounced it in popular assemblies, until the voice of an outraged community was heard and obeyed in that celebrated Act that crowns the name of Bentinck with honour, by having crowned humanity with one of the highest triumphs of good feeling and enlightened reason. But the lawless practice of Coolin polygamy does not stand out so fearfully palpable to the senses as did the horrid rite of Suttee. Both the practice itself, and its revolting accompaniments, are shrouded from the view by the concealments of domestic privacy. But now when, through the quickening impulse that has come from abroad, the Natives themselves, having ears, begin to hear; having eyes, begin to see; having understandings, begin to comprehend; and as the fruit of their hearing, and seeing, and comprehending, begin to rise up as the voluntary reporters of the enormities that are practised amongst them, and the voluntary petitioners for an effective remedy, what remains but that all who sincerely name the name of Christ

should cheerfully second their truly praise-worthy endeavours, and never withdraw their co-operation until triumphant success attend their joint efforts. But it is time to let the Reformer speak for himself.

"The triumph of reason and humanity over demoralizing ignorance and superstition having been consummated in the abolition of the Suttee, it is time we should turn our attention to other superstitions and abuses which continue to degrade the Hindoos, and to prevent their emancipation from the chains of ignorance, and its offspring, immorality.

To

"Polygamy among the Coolin Brahmuns is a prolific source of evils not only to themselves, but to all those who are permitted by the doctrines of caste to form any kind of alliance with them. It is however as opposed to the principles of our Shasters as it is to the dictates of sound reason. prove the evil and demoralizing tendency of polygamy to the English reader, whose mind has been enlightened by the acquirement of moral knowledge and early association of sound principles, would be to attempt what has been already accomplished; for we are persuaded neither Englishmen, nor those who have adopted their notions on morality and social obligations, will for a moment withhold their unqualified condemnation of so unjust and unnatural a practice as polygamy. Indeed, a glance at the laws of England is sufficient to convince the most superficial observer, that this practice is in direct violation of those laws, and that it is an outrage to the feelings of the people who have enacted them. It is however otherwise with the great mass of the Hindoos. Brought up in ignorance, not only of the improved system of morality which directs the enlightened nations of this age, but also of their own Shasters; cherished from their very cradle by the hand of superstition, and taught to reverence the Brahmunical inventions from their mother's lap; they require at this eleventh hour to be told, that polygamy is a vice, that it is opposed to their Shasters, that it is opposed to reason, and that it is the cause of great evils; nay, they require all these truisms to be proved to them by demonstration. Such are the effects of education! It has been truly said,

'Tis education forms the human mind,

Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclined.

"To those of our countrymen who are not yet convinced of the evil tendency of polygamy, we would strongly recommend an impartial inquiry into its effects on society. We would recommend to them to divest themselves for a moment of that great reverence for Coolin Brahmuns which has in a manner spell-bound all the energies of their mind, and to inquire how the system works. We are persuaded they will rise from such inquiries and reflections with a very different opinion on the subject. It will not be difficult for them to discover that when one man possesses a dozen or fifty wives, whom he has married for the sake of money, and who continue to live at their paternal homes in different parts of the country, receiving visits from their husband like those of angels "few and far between," the consequences of such matrimonial alliances cannot ensure that domestic happiness for which marriage was instituted, and which is actually enjoyed by those who confine themselves to its natural limits-an alliance between one man and one woman. We appeal to the experience of those who have had the misfortune of marrying several wives. Let them think of the jealousies, the bickerings, the quarrels, the adulteries, nay even murders to which polygamy gives rise; and then say, whether we are not right in maintaining that it is an evil-it is the bitterest bane of society. But nothing appears to us more irksome and displeasing than to sit down to prove seriously what must be evident to