maintained has now been broken, and S. R. G. has come forward, the champion of the good old ways-the enemy of innovation. Young men's prayer meetings have received a blow, from which they cannot. easily recover. At all events 66 our young friends" cannot go on un

rebuked:

be

For the satisfaction of the writer, it may be worth while to state thet his article will be read with a great deal of interest by one class of persons-good pious people, who appear to think religion, at least in part, consists in finding fault and opposing change. For their benefit he should write often. He must not let the idea, 66 we may thought sarcastic," prevent, as unless told, very few would suspect it. That sarcasm is of the harmless kind. "The advantages of the present system to young men" given, are indeed amusing-"liberty to sing fast tunes, have short sessions, and to have a greater degree of freedom and happiness." His idea of freedom and happiness may be inferred from the illustration brought forward-the sons of Job. It must not be inferred that young men's prayer meetings are the only places where these advantages can be enjoyed. Let S. R. G. come occasionally to our church-no difference about name or locality, and he will hear tunes sung fast enough to satisfy any young man. however fast he may be. If he sits for a few Sabbaths in our choir he will have fully as much freedom and happiness as in any young men's prayer meeting he ever attended. Why! sometimes it is as good as an entertainment. And yet, we have old men, and good old men. Their presence does not have the beneficial effect claimed. And as for short services, why, there is one society in one of our congregations composed exclusively of old people, where the rule is to have one worship and then conclude the exereise, altogether, usually not exceeding forty minutes. How are we to conclude that the reason why our young people attend church, is because of the "fast tunes and the greater degree of freedom and happiness," or the reason why these old men attend their prayer meetings is because of the short sessions? The conclusion follows in the one case as much as in the other.

"Short sessions, fast tunes and greater freedom and happiness" in themselves do not constitute an objection to prayer meetings. They are a great advantage, provided not carried to excess. The idea that to be good, a prayer meeting must be long, sing slow tunes and have a great degree of stiffness and formality, is ridiculous. And yet, this appears to be a common theory. Slowness and stiffness are mistaken for piety and devotion. The result is, the mode in which many prayer meetings are conducted is very well calculated to make them exceedingly wearisome. People attend, because of a sense of duty, not because it is a pleasure.

To see the truth of this, all one has to do is to attend regularly some of our societies. The mode of conducting the exercises is about as follows: When the hour for commencing has arrived, if a number of members be present, some one breaks the silence by remarking, "Well, I believe it is about time to commence." Then a pause. In a little some one sees whose time it is, and remarks, "Mr. A., I believe you are farthest back." Mr. A. pauses a little, walks slowly to the

table, deliberately takes the Psalm book into his hand, occupies two minutes hunting a suitable portion to sing, and then commences. Probably the psalm is very joyful and exultant. Mr. A., however, can sing only three or four tunes, and these he sings turn about. All are very solemn, but it is the tune of the most solemn of all to-night, so, as. the result, a song of triumph becomes a dirge. This being done, two minutes more are spent hunting a chapter. After prayer there is usually another long pause. Then comes the inquiry, "Does any one know where the question for to-night is?" After considerable delay, the question is found, and then comes the "putting round." "Mr. B," says the chairman, "the question is with you." Mr. B. after a little reflection, prefaces his remarks with, "Well, I have but little to say," and then makes a fifteen minutes speech, which but few either young or old, hear. In the course of time the members are very much relieved by hearing, for this they do hear-" But I have nothing further to add, I pass it. Mr. C., sitting next, in a little discovers it his time to speak. He then gives his little speech he has given once a week for a long time, "I am pleased with the remarks made, I have nothing to add for information, I pass it." And so, on it goes, each taking care to waste some time. Now, how are the members engaged? Some are sleeping, some yawning, some exhibiting great signs of weariness, and nearly all wishing the remarks were done. And when the society is dismissed, very often persons who did not speak during the meeting, when coming out are heard to say, "Mr. D's. prayer was exactly fifteen minutes long, I timed it," or "Mr. E. always reads the longest chapter in the Bible," or "Mr. F. is always so prolix, why will he talk, when no one wants to hear him?" or "Mr. G. has such strange views of things. It is a pity he presents them here."

This is a reality. Reader, is it not your experience? And have not you a hundred times longed for some change that would make some members of your society exercise a little common sense? Now, if the sessions of young men's prayer meetings are short-though the time spent, well spent,—-if in the worship fast tunes are sung, when evidently the psalm requires it, if there is such an entire freedom from unnecessary restraint, that the members can without fear speak one to another, and thereby have greater happiness, surely they are deserving of commendation; and those meetings which do not now enjoy these advantages can learn, and as the result both become more interesting, and secure a better attendance of the youth.

Those persons who attend the young men's prayer meeting never had the least intention to seek "an enjoyment which shuns the society of good men." Nothing could be farther from their design. Those meetings, in perhaps every case with us, originated in a necessity. Young men connect themselves with the church, intending to discharge all the duties a profession of religion requires. They soon found great difficulty in conducting worship and speaking to the question in the presence of those more advanced in age. They also knew others who for the same reasons hesitated about connecting themselves with the church, and also others who attended no society, but who perhaps might be influenced to come with them. For mutual benefit they or

ganized a prayer meeting. The aged are not excluded, but invited to visit. The pastor visits that society just as the others. The exercises are the same in all. This then is their origin. Certain persons that feared the Lord "often met together to speak one to another" about the Lord. There is nothing peculiar about this. The origin is good. The deportment of the members is such as should be in such meetings. That levity of which we read is almost unknown. The good that results is soon seen. These persons who wished to become useful members of prayer meetings obtain experience, and soon have sufficient confidence to join with their older brethren, and in four cases out of five do join-although generally unable to change the "modus operandi." Others take their place. Some who never think about attending such places are prevailed on to go. Brought under religious influences, gradually they become interested, until at last they too connect themselves with the church. Thus "the truth of God is borne along from one age to another."

It may be said, if the sessions of different congregations did their duty this neccssity would not exist. Well, but what session does its duty? How many of our congregations would be greatly advantaged had they such meetings? For now there are none to notice the youth. How many of our young men, now apparently lost to the Church, would be reclaimed?

Such are the meetings condemned, such their origins, and such their design. What possible resemblance is there between those who frequent them and either Job's sons or Reboboam?

The illustrations are, like some of the passages of Scripture quoted, excellent in their place, but entirely foreign to the subject.

Selections.

J. A. R.

THE MAJESTY AND SUPREMACY OF THE SCRIPTURES CONFESSED BY A SKEPTIO.

ROUSSEAU.

I WILL confess to you that the majesty of the Scriptures strikes me with admiration, as the purity of the gospel hath its influenec on my heart. Peruse the works of our philosophers, with all their pomp of diction; how mean, how contemptible, are they, compared with the Scriptures. Is it possible that a book at once so simple and sublime, should be merely the work of man? Is it possible that the sacred personage, whose history it contains, should be himself a mere man? Do we find that he assumed the tone of an enthusiast or ambitious sectary? What sweetness, what purity in his manner! What an affecting gracefulness in his dealing! What sublimity in his maxims! What profound wisdom in his discourses! What presence of mind, what subtlety, what truth in his replies! How great the command over his passions! Where is the man, where the philosopher, who could so live and so die, without weakness and without ostentation? When Plato described his imaginary good man loaded with all shame

of guilt, yet meriting the highest rewards of virtue, he describes exactly the character of Jesus Christ; the resemblance was so striking that all the Fathers perceived it.

What prepossession, what blindness must it be to compare the son of Sophronius to the Son of Mary! What an infinite disproportion there is between them! Socrates, dying without pain or ignominy, easily supported his character to the last; and if his death, however easy, had not crowned his life, it might have been doubted whether Socrates, with all his wisdom, was anything more than a vain sophist. He invented, it is said, the theory of morals, others, however, had before put them in practice; he had only to say, therefore, what they had done, and reduce their examples to precepts. Aristides had been just before Socrates defined justice. Leonidas had given up his life for his country before Socrates had declared patriotism to be a duty. The Spartans were a sober people before Socrates recommended sobriety. Before he had ever defined virtue, Greece abounded in virtuous men. But where could Jesus learn among his competitors, that pure and sublime morality, of which he only hath given us both precept and example? The greatest wisdom was made known amongst the most bigoted fanaticism, and the simplicity of the most heroic virtue did honor to the vilest people on earth. The death of Socrates peaceably philosophizing with his friends, appears the m. st agreeable that could be wished for; that of Jesus, expiring in the midst of agonizing pain, abused, insulted and accused by a whole nation, is the most horrible that could be feared. Socrates in receiving the cup of poison blessed indeed the weeping executioner who administered it; but Jesus in the midst of excruciating torments prayed for his merciless tormentors. Yes, if the life and death of Leonidas were those of a sage, the life and death of Jesus are those of a God.

Shall we suppose the evangelical history a mere fietion? Indeed, my friend, it bears 1 ot the marks of fiction; on the contrary, the history of Socrates, which nobody presumes to doubt, is not so well attested as that of Jesus Christ. Such a supposition in part only shifts the difficulty without abbreviating it. It is more inconceivable that a number of persons should agree to write such a history, than that one only should furnish the subject of it. The Jewish authors were incapable of the diction and strangers to the morality contained in the Gospels, the marks of whose truth are so striking and inimitable that the inventor would be a more astonishing character than the hero.

THE CHUROH OF ROME THE ENEMY OF PROGRESS.

MACAULAY.

FROM the time when the barbarians overrun the Western Empire to the time of the revival of letters, the influence of the Church of Rome had been generally favorable to science, to civilization and to good government. But during the last three centuries, to stunt the growth of the human mind has been her chief object. Throughout Christendom, whatever advance has been made in knowledge, in freedom, in

wealth, and in the arts of life, has been made in spite of her, and has everywhere been in inverse proportion to her power. The loveliest and most fertile provinces of Europe have, under her rule, been sunk in poverty, in political servitude, and in intellectual torpor, while Protestant countries, once proverbial for sterility and barbarism, have been turned by skill and industry into gardens, and can boast of a long list of heroes and statesmen, philosophers and poets. Whoever knowing what Italy and Scotland naturally are, and what, four hundred years ago, they actually were, shall now compare the country round Rome with the country round Edinburgh, will be able to form some judgment as to the tendency of Papal domination. The descent of Spain, once the first among monarchies, to the lowest depths of degradation, the elevation of Holland, in spite of many natural disadvantages, to a position such as no commonwealth so small has ever reached, teach the same lesson. Whoever passes in Germany from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant principality, in Switzerland from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant Canton, in Ireland from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant county, finds that he has passed from a lower to a higher grade of civilization. On the other side of the Atlantic the same law prevails. The Protestants of the United States have left far behind them the Roman Catholics of Mexico, Peru and Brazil. The Roman Catholics of Lower Canada remain inert, while the whole continent round them is in a ferment with Protestant activity and enterprise. The French have doubtless shown an energy and an intelligence which, even when misdirected, however justly entitled them to be called a great people. But this apparent exception, when examined, will be found to confirm the rule; for in no country that is called Roman Catholic has the Roman Catholic Church during several generations possessed so little anthority as in France.

LETTER TO A YOUNG MAN ON HIS CONNECTING HIMSELF WITH THE R. P. CHURCH.

THE following letter, we publish at the request of the person to whom it was written. The advice given is seasonable now, as ther.

Byres, near KILMARNOCK (Ayrshire, Scotland), May 30th, 1837. MY DEAR YOUNG FRIEND-The step you have recently taken in uniting with the congregation of is one of the most important in the history of a human being. You have now passed the barrier that separates the people of Christ from the world, and entered on a new relationship, involving new duties, and conferring privileges to which the world you have forsaken is an entire stranger. I sincerely congratulate you on the high honor to which the free grace of God has called you in early life, and trusting to your Christian candor rightly to construe my motives, I beg your earnest attention to a few counsels which may not be regarded as inappropriate at the present time; therefore allow me to point out, in a few particulars, the course you should study to pursue in the new and honorable relationship