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They come in human dress,

With faces we have long and fondly known;
They speak to us in the soul-thrilling tone,
Of earthly love, of human tenderness.

They come in Passion's breath;

And in each beating heart they raise the strife
Of blighted hopes, of bitter memories, rife
With sin and sorrow, with despair and death:

They come in sorrow's hour,

They visit us in Joy's delirious dream,
By day, by night, our ruin is their theme,
Nor time nor place secures us from their power.

Yet fearful, trembling heart,

Be not dismayed, though Legion be their name,
The Captain who doth thee as soldier claim,
Hath armour which will turn aside each dart:

Thy God will be thy strength;

He sends thee not unarmed against the foe,
And, fighting with his weapons, thou shalt know
Comfort and victory, and rest at length.

E. F.

RELIGION. All optics are nonsense, which do not teach men to behold the mighty God that made them; and all geometry is but confusion, which leaves men ignorant of the height and depth of the love of God.-Horneck.

To know the art of alms is greater than to be crowned with the diadem of kings. And yet to convert one soul is greater than to pour out ten thouand talents into the baskets of the poor.-St. Chrysostom,

SHORT MEDITATION FOR THE YOUNG.

CHANGING LIGHT INTO DARKNESS.

"Take heed therefore, that the light which is in thee be not darkness."-St. Luke xi. 35.

Ir is not indeed astonishing, that our sins render us deformed in the sight of God; but that even our moral virtues oftentimes are only sad imperfections; this ought, in truth, to make us tremble! How often, alas it happens, for instance, that our wisdom is nothing more that a carnal and worldly policy; our modesty but an outward show, in order to keep up appearances and obtain the praise of men; our zeal, the offspring of petulance or pride; our freedomrudeness; our reverence, a sham. With what sloth and cowardice do we make our petty sacrifices to God, and which yet we think so great a service; yet alas, how often are they but vain delusions altogether. Lord, what is man, that Thou hast such respect unto him, or the Son of Man that Thou so regardest him. S.

SELF-EXAMINATION.

MEN deceive themselves, in judging of sin by their own sense and reason. We must learn not to rest in our own sense and reason, touching sin; but we are to look into the book of God, and to examine our hearts and lives by the law of God published in his word; the sum whereof we have in the ten commandments: by these we are to examine ourselves, especially by the first and last-the first showing, the motions of our hearts against God, and the last the motions of our hearts against our neighbour.—Elton.

THE PAINTED WINDOW.

FROM the painted windows of our Churches, many a lesson may be taught, and gladly would we see each consecrated window illumined with appropriate subjects portrayed by the hand of the most skilful artist, for we should give unto the Lord the best of all our store. To the young, and unlearned, instruction is most easily conveyed through the medium of the eye, and who can say, how many a worldly thought has been arrested by some sacred story represented on a Church window. Have not our morning devotions been raised by a stream of light pouring in through a painted East-window, imparting a finishing brilliancy to the gorgeous colouring, while at evensong the feelings have been gently soothed, by the calm setting sun darting the colours of the Westernwindow into the body of the Church, and reminding the weary pilgrim of the bright hope, which attends the Christian's departure from this state of trial and warfare.

Our comments are not to be bestowed on the subject, but on the apparent difference betweeen the inside and outside of a painted Church window. Standing in the Church-yard and gazing at the stained glass, we see a dark confused indistinctness, but within the sacred edifice we can trace the beauty of design, which from without is veiled in obscurity.

There are two ways of viewing most things; the gloomy, and the cheering: and there is the religion of the Churchman and the Dissenter. The Churchman is willing and thankful to keep within the Church, and to profit by the voice of the Church; his notions of religion are plain and practical;

spiritual and holy they will be, if he chooses to attend to the Spirit of God's grace, implanted in him in infancy. The instructions of the Church are wise and good, so would her members be if they were obedient. Religion, taught by the Church may be compared to the right-side of a painted window, while that of the Dissenter reminds us of the eye wandering in troubled perplexity, over the wrong side; he has no rules to guide him, and the mind seeks in vain for some clearer enlightenment. There are Christians who have have been made such at the font, but as soon as their limbs gather strength, employ them in walking into the Churchyard, and then they condemn and puzzle themselves with the outside of the windows. Before they quit the precincts of the Church, we would affectionately urge them to re-enter, to examine her teaching, to obey her rules, and not to be discouraged by the careless lives of some of her members. A blessing is sure to follow obedience; therefore, why stand gazing outside when all is clearness within?

We cannot censure those who have never been brought within the Church, but we must question the fervency of our prayers for them, and look well to our own ways, lest our example prove a hindrance to any.

YETTA.

DISCIPLINE.Unless we first be cut and hewn in the mountains, we shall not be fixed in the temple of God; but by incision and contusions our roughness may become plain, or our sparks kindled; and we may be either for the temple or the altar, spiritual building or holy fire, something that God shall delight in.-Taylor.

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So many Festivals occur during this month, that our `notice of each of them must necessarily be brief. They stand like a group of stars, the lesser ones clustering around one of surpassing magnitude and brilliancy. For among them is the greatest and most joyful of all our holy days, the crown and glory of the year, the day on which the Saviour was born into the world! We will take the lesser luminaries first, and reserve for a few closing remarks, the great Festival of Christmas, which, if God spare us, we shall now shortly again celebrate to His praise and glory.

ST. THOMAS, the Apostle, sometimes called Didymus or the Twin, was a Jew of Gallilee, and generally supposed to have been a fisherman like Peter and John. Two remarkable things are recorded of him in Holy Scripture: first, his zeal and devotion, in being willing to hazard his life, rather than abandon his Lord. "Let us also go, that we may die with Him!" (John, ix., 16); and, secondly, contrasted with this, the striking want of faith, that led him to question the reality of Christ's resurrection, without a fullness and superfluity of proof, which only the kindest and most indulgent of Masters would have condescended to grant. "Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands, and reach hither thy hand and VOL. VIII-No. 12.

N

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