in distress. Mrs. ——, our kind visitor, recommended them to a Sick Relief Society, and I was enabled to relieve them with bread and coal-tickets, supplied me by our benevolent friends. Their temporal distress was not greater than their spiritual darkness and general ignorance; they cannot read, and both candidly acknowledged they had not attended anywhere to hear about religion for years; they were very willing and appeared anxious to receive instruction, which I have and still do impart to them, with exhortation to repent and believe the Gospel, which is evidently a new thing to them, and I have ground to hope they will receive the truth, notwithstanding the efforts of the parson, as they call the parish minister, to prevent it. I had thus pursued my labours some time, and was happy to see them recovering from their illness, and appreciating my feeble instructions, and obtaining knowledge thereby, when one day, the woman who keeps the house, on my entering, said, "We have had a strange man here since you came last; they say he is the parson of the parish, I suppose the parish doctor sent him; but I never heard such nonsense as he talked in all my life. When I opened the door he said, 'Have you a man and his wife sick here ?' I told him, 'Yes.' 'Do you believe in Christ ?' he replied. I did not know what to answer, so said nothing. He then said, 'Do they owe you any money?' I said, 'A few shillings. I thought he was going to pay it for them, but he did not; he said he wanted to see them, and I took him up-stairs; when he got up he stood at the foot of the bedstead, and said to them, 'Do you believe in Christ?' they did not know what to say, so they, like me, were silent; he then asked something about had they been 'con' something; " I said "Confirmed;"Yes,' said the woman. "What did he mean by that ?" I explained, and she proceeded: "They said, 'No,' but I am sure they didn't know what he meant. He then put his hand in his pocket, and said, 'Do you know I am the Minister of this Parish? Now if you will promise that you will come to church and be confirmed, I will give you a shilling. Will you, now? for I delight in nothing so much as getting people confirmed; and then to have them eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ in the blessed sacrament.'" The woman continued, “They didn't know what all this meant, nor did I; what did he mean?" I explained this also, and then asked how the matter ended. Why, they made no promise, so he gave them the shilling and left, and has never been since, and they don't want him, for he will give them no more without they make the promise he wants, and that they won't; and it's no use his coming, for they say what is true enough, he did not tell them anything, and they think he should have took the Bible and taught them." Thus I have given the woman's account of this singular visit in her own language. I may add, when I saw the people they related the same tale, nearly in the same words. They are now recovering, and the man especially seems awakened to seek salvation; time will show what it will come to. SECOND CASE. Visiting a Mrs., she related the following facts of the conduct of the district minister of Church; she spoke of the treatment without the least feeling of bitterness; indeed, with apparent grief. The woman has long been a consistent member among the Wesleyans; she received a hurt while at work soveral months ago, and has been unable to follow her employment ever since, and in consequence was reduced to deep distress. Some of the neighbours knowing that money had been received for the Poor of the district, made the case known to the minister, who came to see her. On entering the room, he said, "And what's the matter with you?" She told him. "I understand you don't come to church, but belong to the Methodists ?" She assented. "And what good do you think you can get from them-what can they do for you?' She replied, she hoped she had got good from them, and had cause to bless God she ever entered a Wesleyan chapel. "Well, then," he answered, "you may go to them for your relief, for I shall give you none; go to them, and let them help you and get you well," and instantly left the room. The woman was closely questioned as to the correctness of her statement, it appeared so inhuman; she assured me every word was true, and added she had not a morsel of bread at the time, nor wherewith to get any. I am, for the truth's sake, obliged to say, this minister passes for an Evangelical; so that all parties seem combined to make the people go to church or suffer for their contumacy. THIRD CASE. This case differs in some points from the others; it is in connection with a man named G--, whose case has been reported to the Association. He was, when first met with by us, "living without God, and without hope in the world." The Holy Spirit was pleased to bless the means employed to awaken and quicken him; and after giving all the evidence his case and circumstances admitted of, he has finished his course, to all appearance, triumphantly. I must not intrude on your space by giving a long account of him, though it might be interesting and encouraging to your readers, but confine myself to that part which bears on the subject of my communication. During his last days his sufferings were at times most excruciating; one of these days his friends were so affected by witnessing them, that one of them, unknown to him, run to fetch the doctor, who was soon at his bedside; the doctor appeared struck, and knew not what to do or say. G-, perceiving this, asked if he thought the time was come that he must go, adding, "You need not fear telling me, for, thank God, I am not now afraid to die." The doctor answered, he thought he would not be long, not many hours; and then, addressing the wife, said, "You had better send for a minister, and let him give him the sacrament, while he has his senses; he may not have them long." The wife had related thus far, when the dying man revived a little, and said, "And what good would that have done me, to send for a minister to give me the sacrament? I wanted his Master; none else, nor anything else would do for me now; poor fellow, to give such advice! I trust I have the Master with me; if I had recovered I should have liked to join with the Lord's people, and show forth his death; but I think it can do a dying man no case the poor man was wiser than his good." doctor; he knew if he had the presence of Christ it was enough, and he appeared to have had it to the last; he continued to suffer for several days after this, but not a murmur was heard; when he could speak he was heard praying, and at times telling of his joy in the Lord, and hope of glory through the merits of Christ, and not through sacramental efficacy. J. H. Thus, then, we see, in this case, that some of our medical gentlemen are, unintentionally we would hope, helping on the delusion of sacramental efficacy, so industriously pressed on the people by the Clergy, and which too many of them are very ready to receive, as it suits better with depraved nature than "repentance toward God, faith in Christ, and a holy life." But in this Pepery. CONSECRATION OF BELLS. ENGLAND has of late been much disturbed on the subject of Baptism; the Law-Courts have resounded with arguments for and against Baptismal Regeneration. On this subject there is no controversy in Rome; but one opinion is allowed to be expressed there, whatever may be held. It is, moreover, the practice of the Romanists to baptize other objects beside children, and among them Bells! The following parallel will serve to illustrate the system : We shall here give part of one of the very curious prayers put up for the bell at its baptism: Lord, grant that wheresoever this holy bell, thus washed (or baptized) and blessed, shall sound, all deceits of Satan, all danger of whirlwind, thunders, lightnings, and tempests, may be driven away, and that devotion may increase in Christian men when they hear it. O Lord, sanctify it by thy Holy Spirit, that when it sounds in thy people's ears they may adore Thee! May their faith and devotion increase, the devil be afraid, and tremble and fly at the sound of it. This shows the tact with which Popery turns everything to its purpose of exciting the ignorant multitude, and diffusing among them the spirit of superstition and wonder. Few of the things it has baptized supply a larger amount of make-believe than the Bell. The Letter Box. INDUSTRY AND IDLENESS. YOUNG MEN,-On the present occasion we have the pleasure of introducing to you a friend of ours and yours, although divided from you by three thousand miles of flood,-the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, of the United States, whose Lectures to Young Men, on various subjects, have just been issued in this country. The volume, which is one of great excellence, is introduced, in a valuable dissertation, from the pen of Dr. Dobbin. It comprises Lectures on Industry and Idleness-Twelve Causes of Dishonesty-Six Warnings-Gamblers and Gambling-The Strange Woman-Popular Amusements-and exhibits a Portrait Gallery, in which the Wit, the Humourist, the Cynic, the Libertine, the Politician, the Demagogue, the Party Man, may recognize their own faces. As bearing on the subject on which we are incessantly exhorting you, we shall cite a portion of his Lecture on Industry and Idleness: In a town of lazy men, I should expect to find crazy houses, shingles and weather-boards knocked off; doors hingeless, and all a-creak; windows stuffed with rags, hats, or pillows. Instead of flowers in summer, and warmth in winter, every side of the house would swarm with vermin in hot weather, and with starvling pigs in cold; fences would be curiosities of lazy contrivance, and gates hung with ropes, or lying flat in the mud. Lank cattle would follow every loaded waggon, supplicating a morsel, with famine in their looks. Children would be ragged, dirty, saucy; the school-house empty; the gaol full; the church silent; the grog-shops noisy; and the carpenter, the saddler, and the blacksmith, would do their principal work at taverns. Lawyers would reign; constables flourish, and hunt sneaking criminals; burly justices, (as their interests might dictate,) would connive a compromise, or make a commitment. The peace-officers would wink at tumults, arrest rioters in fun, and drink with them in good earnest. Good men would be obliged to keep dark, and bad men would swear, fight, and rule the town. Public days would be scenes of confusion, and end in rows; elections would be drunken, illegal, boisterous, and brutal. The young abhor the last results of idleness; but they do not perceive that the first steps lead to the last. They are in the opening of this career; but with them it is genteel leisure, not laziness; it is relaxation, not sloth; amusement, not indolence. But leisure, relaxation, and amusement, when men ought to be usefully engaged, are indolence. A specious industry is the worst idleness. A young man perceives that the first steps lead to the last, with everybody but himself. He sees others become drunkards by social tippling, he sips socially, as if he could not be a drunkard. He sees others become dishonest, by petty habits of fraud; but will indulge slight aberrations, as if he could not become knavish. Though others, by lying, lose all character, he does not imagine that his little dalliances with falsehood will make him a liar. He knows that salacious imaginations, villanous pictures, harlot snuff boxes, and illicit familiarities, have led thousands to her door, whose house is the way to hell; yet he never sighs nor trembles lest these things should take him to this inevitable way of damnation! In reading these strictures upon In. dolence, you will abhor it in others, without suspecting it in yourself. While you read, I fear you are excusing yourself; you are supposing that your leisure has not been laziness; or that, with your disposition, and in your circumstances, Indolence is harmless. Be not deceived: if you are idle, you are on the road to ruin; and there are few stopping-places upon it. It is rather a precipice than a road. While I point out the temptation to Indolence, ecrutinize your course, and pronounce honestly upon your risk. 1. Some are tempted to Indolence by their wretched training, or, rather, wretched want of it. How many families are the most remiss, whose low condition and sufferings are the strongest inducement to industry. The children have no inheritance, yet never work; no education, yet are never sent to school. It is hard to keep their rags around them, yet none of them will earn better raiment. If ever there was a case when a government should interfere between parent and child, that seems to be the one where children are started in life with an education of vice. If, in every community, three tnings should be put together, which always work together, the front would be a grog-shop, the middle a gaol, the |