observance. How then did the Romish church fix on December the 25th as Christmas Day? Why, thus: Long before the fourth century, and long before the Christian era itself, a festival was celebrated among the heathen at that precise time of the year, in honour of the birth of the son of the Babylonian queen of heaven; and it may fairly be presumed that, in order to conciliate the heathen, and to swell the number of the nominal adherents of Christianity, the same festival was adopted by the Roman church, giving it only the name of Christ." "In Egypt, the son of Isis, the Egyptian title for the queen of heaven, was born at this very time, 'about the time of the winter solstice.' The very name by which Christmas is popularly known among ourselves-Yule Dayproves at once its Pagan and Babylonian origin. Yule,' is the Chaldee name for an infant' or 'little child;' and as the 25th of December was called by our Pagan Anglo-Saxon ancestors, 'Yule Day,' or 'Child's Day, and the night that preceded it, Mother-night,' long before they came in contact with Christianity, that sufficiently proves its real character." "The candles in some parts of England lighted on Christmas Eve, and used so long as the festive season lasts, were equally lighted by the Pagans on the eve of the festival of the Babylonian god, to do honour to him; for it was one of the distinguishing peculiarities of his worship to have lighted wax candles on his altars. The Christmas-tree, now so common among us, was equally common in Pagan Rome and Pagan Egypt." "The yule log is the seed stock of Nimrod deified as the sungod, but cut down by his enemies; the Christmas tree is Nimrod redivivus-the slain god come to life again." Even the mistletoebough was derived from Babylon. "The mistletoe was regarded as a divine branch-a branch that came from heaven, and grew upon a tree that sprung out of the earth. Thus by the engrafting of the celestial branch into the earthly tree, heaven and earth, that sin had severed, were joined together, and thus the mistletoe-bough became the token of divine reconciliation to man, the kiss being the well-known token of pardon and reconciliation." Even the Christmas goose proves the union between the old and the New Babylon. "Yea, the Christmas goose,' and yule cakes,' were essential articles in the worship of the Babylonian Messiah, as that worship was practised both in Egypt and at Rome." Whence Lady - day? It is celebrated by the Roman church in commemoration of the miraculous conception of our Lord, but without any evidence of its accordance with it in regard to time. The real reason of this festival is thus stated: "Before our Lord was either conceived or born, that very day now set down in the Popish calendar for the 'Annunciation of the Virgin,' was observed in Pagan Rome in honour of Cybele, the mother of the Babylonian Messiah." "Then look at Easter. What means the term Easter itself? It is not a Christian name. It bears its Chaldean origin on its very forehead. Easter is nothing else than Astarte, one of the titles of Beltis, the queen of heaven, whose name as pronounced by the people of Nineveh was evidently identical with that now in common use in this country. That name, as found by Layard on the Assyrian monuments, is Ishtar. The forty days' abstinence of Lent was directly borrowed from the worshippers of the Babylonian goddess. Such a Lent of forty days, 'in the spring of the year,' is still observed by the Yezidis, or Pagan Devil-worshippers of Koordistan, who have inherited it from their early masters, the Babylonians." It is also observed in Egypt and Sabea. The Easter buns even, and their very name, may be traced to Chaldea. Jeremiah, alluding to these, says, "The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven." Whence the observance of Midsummer Day? "When the Papacy sent its emissaries over Europe, towards the end of the sixth century, to gather the Pagans into its fold, this festival was found in high favour in many countries. What was to be done with it? Were they to wage war with it? No. This would have been contrary to the famous advice of Pope Gregory I., that by all means, they should meet the Pagans half-way, and so bring them into the Romish church. The Gregorian policy was carefully observed; and so Midsummer Day, that had been hallowed by Paganism to the worship of Tammuz, was incorporated as a sacred Christian festival in the Roman calendar. But still a question was to be determined. What was to be the name of this Pagan festival? . . . . If the name of Christ could not be conveniently tacked to it, what should hinder its being called by the name of his forerunner, John the Baptist?" "Now having fixed on the 25th of December for the celebration of the birth of Christ, and John Baptist having been born six months before, the Pagan festival of the 24th of June, was styled, The feast of the Nativity of St. John.'" Whence baptismal regeneration? 6 This also comes from Babylon. "So far as heathenism is concerned, the following extracts from Potter and Athenæus speak distinctly enough. Every person,' says the former, who came to the solemn sacrifice (of the Greeks) was purified by water. To which end at the entrance of the temples there was commonly placed a vessel full of holy water.' How did this water get its holiness? This water was consecrated, says Athenæus, by putting into it a burning torch taken from the altar. ... Now this very same method is used in the Romish church for consecrating the water for baptism. The unsuspicious testimony of Bishop Hay leaves no doubt on this point: It' (the water kept in the baptismal font), says he, is blest on the eve of Pentecost, because it is the Holy Ghost who gives to the waters of baptism the power and efficacy of sanctifying our souls, and because the baptism of Christ is with the Holy Ghost, and with fire.' In blessing the water a lighted torch is put into the font." Whence purgatory and prayers for the dead? Again, we reply, from Babylon. "In every system, except that of the Bible, the doctrine of a purgatory after death, and prayers for the dead, have always been found." "Plato, speaking of the future judgment of the dead, holds out the hope of final deliverance for all; but maintains that, of 'those who are judged,' some must first proceed to a subterranean place of judgment, where they shall sustain the punishment they have deserved." "In Pagan Rome, purgatory was equally held up before the minds of men; but there, there seems to have been no hope held out to any of exemption from its pains. In Dryden's Virgil the differences of these purgatorial sufferings are thus pourtrayed : 66 6 • For this are various penances enjoined; And some are hung to bleach upon the wind, But the pure ether of the soul remains.' The Paganism of the Christianity of some Protestants may be discovered here." Prayers for the dead ever go hand-in-hand with purgatory." When the Pharisees are said to "devour widows' houses, and for a pretence make long prayer," they are charged with the heathen practice of extorting money for praying for the dead. In this way we might proceed to show that all of Papal Christianity, except the name, is borrowed from the idolatrous customs which had their origin in ancient Babylon. The Pontifex Maximus, the infallibility, the sacrifice of the Mass, the processions, the conclave of cardinals, the power of the keys, the mitre, the crosier, the priestly celibacy, the monks and nuns, the worship of images and of relics, the fastings and penance, the tonsure, the rosary-in fact, all Romanism is Paganism under the Christian name. Well might the reading of the Scriptures be prohibited to its votaries, since none of its requirements could be found there. Its reference to ecclesiastical traditions is purposely intended to put enquirers upon a wrong scent. The fact can no longer be concealed that Romanism is the reproduction and perpetuation of the old Babylonian idolatry, and it is so in all, even its minutest, particulars. This calls for the most serious consideration, not of the Church of England merely, which retains many features of resemblance to the church from whence it came, but of many Protestant churches, which are but one more remove both from the old Babylon and the new. "What concord hath Christ with Belial?" Belial is Bel or Baal, the chief deity of Babylon; and is here mentioned as the type of all infidelity and idolatry. "Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols?" All are either of Christ or of Belial. There can be no union of the two. "Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." Pea Soup and Bread. BY EDWARD LEACH. T was a bleak, wet morning, and the streets of London were coated with a liquid paste of intolerable consistency-such mud as few other cities can boast of, or would care to retain so long without energetic efforts for its removal. In a narrow court, situated in one of the least fragrant nooks of the thousands of insalubrious haunts of poverty in the great city, we came upon a mission chapel, which was being besieged by a crowd of youngsters, of both sexes and of every degree of wretchedness. Such a tribe of tatterdemalions is not to be seen in one group every day. Pushing, contriving, almost fighting their way through the narrow door that led to the area of the building, these children of want were seeking with no small anxiety to enjoy a feast to which they were unaccustomed in the miserable hovels they call their homes. At last they all succeeded in effecting, without accident or serious quarrel, an entrance, and when this was accomplished there was an amusing scramble for first places and chosen seats, which resulted, contrary to the Darwinian hypothesis, in the strongest going to the wall, for the weak children knew how to care for themselves, and the younger they were and the less protected, the more acute and determined they seemed to be. Those who secured the highest seats retained them with such resolution that he would have been a hero who could have forcibly dislodged them. What prehensile power these little fellows had! One thing they knew, if no other-that possession is nine points of the law, and for the remaining point they were utterly regardless. He might win who could, and he who could was permitted to win. So, questions of place settled, every one good-humouredly sets his or her little heart upon the expected treat. The girls maintain silence, and graciously smooth down the rumpled clothes of their sisters, while the boys chaff and whistle, and hurrah with evident satisfaction to themselves, making hideous discord with their mugs and jugs, and miscellaneous crockery: for "miscellaneous" is the only right word with which to describe the curious and varied assortment of utensils furnished them by their parents. Mugs without handles, jugs without spouts, basins that were out of proportion to the size of those who carried them, cracked china, dilapidated brown ware, shapely and shapeless-a more unique collection we never saw. Then for spoons-those who had any pewter, tin, and iron, of varied age and disability-there was a singular variety. Wonderfully patient were they all until the arrival of the first can of steaming hot soup. Then began the "Hip, hip, hurrah!" of the boys, and the gleesome chatter of the girls; and the smallest child and the dirtiest (and small and dirty many of them were) looked bright with expectation. Some set to work to empty the well-filled basins, and mugs and jugs, with a sober earnestness, while others attacked the provender timidly, with an awkwardness partly due to novelty, but in some cases traceable to the peculiarly ungainly and inconvenient utensils containing the soup, and the equally inconvenient spoons or ladles with which they conveyed it to their mouths. There was no stint in the supply; the most voracious was satisfied, and there was not the sign of a sigh for more, when they left the building with their empty, greasy, cracked crockeryware. Such a repast was sumptuous to them. On the next day they would have to be content with the less nourishing food furnished by their poor parents, but might remember, as no doubt they would, that pea soup and bread would be their fare again ere the week had closed; for during the severe winter two and sometimes three dinners were given to the poor children of the district at this commodious mission chapel, so that they were better fitted to brave the inclemency which carried to an untimely grave so many other little hungry ones. Pea-soup dinners have of late been the fashion among the unfashionable. One would think that the virtues and properties of this decoction had never been fully understood before, or that its suitability and cheapness for the famishing poor had not been discovered. Certain it is, that we owe the establishment of the first metropolitan soup-kitchen to the distress caused in the autumn and winter of 1846 by the potato blight. From that day to the present the institution has been growingly popular. Charitable persons of all creeds, and of no distinctive creed at all, have found in this an opportunity for supplying a great want, and have vied with each other in dispensing freely the golden-coloured liquid to the needy and hungry. Scarcely a Christian church is without its soup-kitchen, and to many mission-halls it is a necessary adjunct; in some we believe it is the only really useful branch of the work. Those whose gifts or persuasiveness can only influence twenty persons to suffer the word of exhortation at a service of religion may attract a large number to a service of soup. Really we are not surprised that the poor should doggedly decline to be bored by some of the so-called evangelists, who have no qualification whatever for preaching, and are only, by their failure, illustrations of the necessity of treating even the poorest as somewhat higher in intelligence than infants. While chapels and mission-halls have done their share, schools have also dispensed cheap food. Indeed, so numerous are the public and private kitchens, and so many the appeals made for funds to carry them on, that an attempt to report upon them for the guidance of the benevolent deserves our heartiest thanks. Such an attempt has been made by a society, organized for charitable relief and the repression of mendicity. We do not now express our opinion on the work which this society seeks to do, although we object to district committees relieving people of whom they know nothing, and can know nothing, and fear that such an arrangement will encourage rather than repress mendicity. As a rule the exceptions being where certain common-sense safeguards against imposition are violated-those who labour among the poor are best fitted to judge as to their worthiness to receive relief, while committees are easily befooled. A badly-dressed man recently succeeded in obtaining a loan of money from a committee, with which to purchase a suit of clothes, to enable him to obtain a situation; but if the said committee had only consulted an evangelist labouring in the immediate district, they might with far greater wisdom have retained their cash. We do not argue that every minister should combine the dispensation of temporal relief with his spiritual duties, but we are fully persuaded that |