right as pastor, to insist upon the singing of old tunes, and especially those of slow movement. By perseverance he succeeded. This fact indicates, however, that much of the blame of the present state of things rests with the churches themselves, and especially with the pastors. Let them insist upon it, that the control of the singing, not only when to sing, but what and how to sing, shall remain in their hands; and let them see to it, that the service of song in the house of the Lord shall be, not a profane exhibition of fine singing, or loud voices, but an act of united praise of all the congregation."

"Music is again the chosen implement for sapping the walls of Zion and defacing its beauty. People used to go to church to worship God. This seems, on the whole, to be the scriptural idea of going to church. But they are now invited to the sanctuary to enjoy a musical treat; in many cases to witness a melo-dramatic performance-a sort of Sunday opera, mollified, indeed, but in full keeping with the opera of the other six days. As yet these are, with us, exceptional instances. But any church may grow to them in time. Already it has come to be recog nized in very numerous congregations, and confined to no one sect, as an indispensable means of what is called "success," to provide the most artistic and elaborate music. Churches are not ashamed to compete with each other, in holding out inducements of this sort to allure visitors. Multitudes of young people, forsaking the pews where they belong, are flitting about from church to church "to hear the music." This is the acknowledged motive. They have too much candor to pretend that they go to join in the prayers and praises of the sanctuary, or to hear the preaching of the gospel. They go simply to be regaled with fine singing. This is the end they aim at; and this the burden of their report when the service is over. The preaching is nothing—the less of it (in their esteem) the better.

It is the common vice of empirics that they never learn anything. If it were otherwise, these people would see that they have only taken up a system of practice which has been in vogue for ages in the Oriental churches and the Church of Rome. Those churches offer them satisfactory exhibitions of a mere spectacular Christianity. The methods they have adopted, if persisted in, would in time assimilate any Protestant church to these Hierarchies. And if they cannot, or will not, see it, the Christians of these communions ought to see it, and put a stop to this pestilent tampering with sacred things.

If you cannot endure the simplicity of the New Testament ceremonial; if the central place assigned by Christ to the preaching of the gospel, offend you; if the house of God be in your esteem a mere music hall or theatre-and the only worship you crave be an oratorio or a drama-why insist upon fashioning Protestant churches to this style of devotion? If the scheme be so captivating in the bud, the full bloom must be still the better. Why not go at once to some Romish church, where you will be certain to find all you are yearning for, without the toil, and the delay, and the unseemliness of attempting to effect this transformation in churches established to protest against a sensuous religion?"

"A TIME TO DANCE."

Ir will perhaps be affirmed, that although dancing has been authorized and sanctioned as a religious exercise, and although for many centuries its employment as a worldly amusement was for the purpose of mimicking the worshipers of the true God, and pouring contempt upon him and his ordinances, yet now it has changed its character and become as innocent as any other kind of sport. We have met with many professors of religion who adopted this view, and not a few who even acted upon it. Is it correct?

1. Is it not a perversion of a sacred exercise from its original design, and a prostitution of it to purposes of mere pastime? It is replied, that dancing has ceased to be a divine ordinance under the gospel. Millions of respectable and intelligent Christians deny this assertion. But even granting that as a religious rite it belongs to the old dispensation, what then? Are young people at liberty to degrade it for mere amusement? Shall a solemn exercise engaged in for thousands of years, on very special occasions, by persons eminent for piety, be linked with squeaking fiddles and merry peals of laughter? Can indulgence through sport in anything that God has ever sanctioned for purposes of public worship, be innocent? The Passover has long since ceased to be a religious feast. Would it be perfectly harmless for a band of youth to meet together and go through all the ceremonies connected with its observance, for the purpose of adding to the amusement of an evening party? The Jewish altar and the bloody sacrifice have been abolished; but who would dare to rebuild that altar and offer a victim upon it, to excite laughter and awaken merriment? So, although it were granted that dancing, as a religious institution, has passed away, yet it must not be prostituted to pleasure and recreation. under the gospel. God will not be mocked, and indulgence through sport in any thing which he has employed publicly in his own worship, cannot fail to excite his displeasure. And if, as multitudes believe, it is still, like fasting, a proper exercise for Christians, under extraordinary circumstances, then how fearful the sin of which those who dance for amusement are guilty? Who is not shocked at the infamous conduct of those Corinthians who ventured to convert the Lord's supper into a table of devils? Was Paul not right in telling them, "When ye come together into one place, this is not to eat the Lord's supper, for one is hungry and another drunken. Despise ye the church of God?" And are we startled to find him pointing them to the tokens of avenging wrath, saying, "For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself." No, my young friends, drag not into the circle of your recreations any sacred ordinance of God, whether it belong to the present or a former dispensation; for the Lord will not suffer you to escape his righteous judgment.

2. Is it a fact that dancing has ceased to be employed in mockery of God and his worship? What mean those vast processions of German, French, and other scoffers and infidels, that are so often seen marching

out of some of our principal cities on the holy Sabbath, to spend the day with music and dancing in the neighboring groves, where bold blasphemers denounce the Bible, the sanctuary and all the institutions of Christianity? What mean the weekly exhibitions in those large towns and extensive settlements in the West, where crowds assemble in the ball-room from one Sabbath to another, to show their contempt for the day and its Author? Promiscuous dancing is one of the leading influences by means of which the man of sin is now striving to crush the cause of our Reedeemer in this land. The cry of multitudes engaged in this amusement, is, "No God, no Bible, no priest, no religion!" And their numbers are being augmented by every fresh arrival of emigrants from the old world. Their favorite "time to dance" is just when they can dishonor the Lord most by it. So offensive has this mockery become, that Christian cities have had to invoke the local authorities for its suppression. In the newly settled districts of the West, where this anti-Christian spirit predominates, I have preached with the sound of the fiddle, the noise of the dancers, the crack of the rifle, the rattle of the reaping machine, and the rumbling of the hay wagon, within hearing of the sanctuary. Next to the bar-room, and generally in close proximity to it, the ball-room is Satan's mightiest weapon for opposing the word and worship of our God and Saviour. Shall, then,

the children of our Sabbath schools and churches give it their countenance and patronage?

3. Is it a "comparatively intellectual amusement?" There is nothing in the dance (as now practiced) requiring intellect, learning, or refinement of mind and manners. A dog, a goat or a monkey, can be trained to excel in this exercise. I have seen a negro boy, of seven years old, without the first elements of an education, dance with a grace and agility of motion that would put to the blush the brightest star of the fashionable ball-room. The most accomplished dancers in the world are untutored savages, who practice, in a state of nudity, around their camp-fires. What special incentive then can a cultivated, intellectual, refined youth have to waste precious time in an amusement in which, after all, he may be surpassed by a rude Hottentot, or even by an ape? Even those who are proficient in teaching the art are despised and ridiculed, the world over, as brainless fops. You could scarcely offer a respectable gentleman a greater insult than call him a dancing master. Many of the plays and sports of modern times require ingenuity and promptness of thought and perception; but this demands but little exertion of the intellectual powers, and to excel in it scarcely anything except "the light fantastic toe" is needed. Many persons, when perfectly sober, make a most awkward figure in a ballroom; but "when they get their spirits up by pouring spirits down," they become expert dancers. And is this "the comparatively intellectual amusement" against which the officers of the church are boldly challenged to adduce Scripture?

4. The modern dance for amusement is exceedingly demoralizing. Wicked men have discovered this, if Christians have not; and “the children of the world are wiser, in their generation, than the children of light." In our large cities, when not prohibited by laws strictly

enforced by the police, the world employs the dance to lure unthinking crowds into the lowest dens of vice and infamy. Such was the case, till recently, even in our national Capitol. It is still practiced in many of our populous cities. Front apartments in beer-saloons and houses of prostitution, separate from the streets only by glass plates, are supplied with fiddlers and shameless dancers, whose indecent exposure of person and fantastic movements meet the eye of every passer by, and lure the inexperienced and unwary into these abodes of crime and shame. Should an intelligent, Christian people sanction an amusement that is rapidly filling many parts of our land with disease, degradation and misery; and which may yet school some of our own sons and daughters for ornamenting a beer-saloon or brothel ?

"Vice is a monster of so frightful mien,
As to be hated, needs but to be seen;
Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,
We first endure, then pity, then embrace."

Children of most respectable families, accustomed to "the innocent amusement of dancing," have acquired such a passionate fondness for gay attire and light and frivolous pastime, that they have fled from the parental mansion to slake their thirst in just such dens. Some have been known, when discovered and entreated with all the pleading eloquence of a father's and mother's tears to return, to refuse compliance with their earnest wishes, alleging that the gilded trappings and lascivious sports and pleasures of these sinks of iniquity, had overpowering influence over their minds. A case of this kind occurred only a short time ago, in the city of Pittsburgh, and the civil authorities were appealed to by the distressed parents, to rescue their deluded daughter from a life of infamy by confining her in "the House of Refuge.

Let parents and guardians of youth take warning, and beware how they encourage an amusement fraught with such fearful consequences! "Touch not the unclean thing." "Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil: that put darkness for light, and light for darkness: that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter." The direct tendency of the promiscuous dance is to stifle serious convictions, fill the mind with folly and frivolity, bring the young in contact with the vile and licentious, steel the heart against the claims of virtue and religion, and lead them down to vice, wretchedness and ruin.

I might safely appeal to parents and children to say whether dancing promotes the growth of grace and developes the life of godliness, or whether it does not deaden religious sensibilities, give a dis-relish for gospel ordinances, and excite strong prejudices and bitter feelings toward ministers and pious people who discountenance the practice? Judging from forty years' experience, I know of no surer way of driving the Spirit of God from the heart, and cutting the soul loose from hallowed influence, than to acquire a fondness for this demoralizing amusement. This, moreover, is the united testimony of all branches of the Evangelical Church, as expressed through their highest judicatories.-Pres. Banner.

ENCOURAGE YOUR PASTOR.

AFTER all, ministers are just about the same as anybody else-made out of about the same material, and have just about the same amount and kind of human nature that anybody else has; and they would be good for nothing as ministers if they were otherwise. They experience the same pains and pleasures, are sensitive to both heat and cold, both physically and spiritually, as other folks. Their hearts are affected by a kindly smile or an offensive frown, as soon and as keenly as men of other callings. And amid all the diversities of treatment they are expected and must deport themselves as men above the mediocre of manhood, as examples to all. Perhaps no other class of men have so many antagonistic elements, and such oppugnant impulses to deal with, as ministers. They must understand every language in the neighbor-. hood-bear all the ills that flesh is heir to-must go at the beck of this one, and come at the nod of that one. Not an hour may be absolutely appropriated to self. They must so adjust their pastoral visits as not to seem to monopolize special places or special families; in fine, they must so do that there shall be no possible chance for critics and eavesdroppers to accuse them of partiality. They must, especially, know some if not all the virtues of each individual, so that when the eulogium shall be pronounced over the coffined one, everything acceptable to the ears of vanity may be rehearsed. Their wives, (dear things,) too, are common property and must go-it don't matter what hindrances there are at the will and whims of those who are always "abundant in labors" for others. Their children, too, must be above reproach in every particular, otherwise the "training is bad at home," and the old adage is again verified that ministers' sons and deacons' daughters all arewell, I don't remember what--but anything but "proper nice children." Such, perhaps, in brief, is the programme which custom has established, and a minister without them would begin to look around for the evidence of his calling, or dream that the millennial morn was nearly at its dawn. Now, then, may we not say, and say it with some significance, too, encourage your pastor-because under this system of restraints and strictures, more than any other man, he needs your encouragement, your heartfelt sympathy, and none will be so welcome to him as the man who comes to him with a heart brimfull of co-operation in every word and work. He needs the cheer of your smiles to dispel the clouds that have begloomed his heart. No one can tell what a flood of light a kind word will beam in upon his depressed spirits. Meet him as you would your ordinary fellow men-made up of the same material and susceptible to the same influences that ordinary sinners are. Don't put on a religious habit because you are talking with your minister-be natural. Don't suspect that he will think your piety is waning if you do not suggest the low state of piety in the church. Don't feel that a woe is laid upon you if you do not tell him that the prayer meeting is not as lively as it used to be, and that it is becoming less intercsting. Now, all these and hundreds more are only negative consolations. They are really, though common, yet very un