the world on purpose to help you, I, who shed every drop of my blood for you, I, who watched continually over the state of your souls, I, who in your flesh had a feeling of your infirmities, knew the temptations you were exposed to, and saw you struggling manfully against them. I, who was a witness of your repentance, faith, and sincerity, and will not be severe to mark what you have done amiss, and have a better righteousness than your own to put upon you; I, who pitied you with much tenderness when you were perishing in sin, and have taken you into my heart, because ye believed my words, received me for your Saviour, and accounted it your glory to be my disciples; I will come again and receive you to myself." I will not depute any other to be your Judge, neither man nor angel; but I, your friend and brother, bone of your bone, and flesh of your flesh, and alone qualified for the office by my knowledge of your hearts and bowels of compassion; I will take your cause into my own hands, overlook your failings, make the most of your obedience, crown your faith and trust in me, and assign you a reward, not suited so much to your deserts, as the love I had for you; I will not dispose of you in a separate place, nor bestow any kind of happiness upon you but what I know to be exceeding great, "such as eye hath not seen, nor ear heard," &c. It shall be the place and happiness you have desired, and longed, and been preparing for, "I will receive you to myself, that where I am there you may be also;" doubt not of my power to do this, for it is equal to my love. I, who speak the words, am mighty to save; " and to him that overcometh, will I give to eat of the tree of life which is in the midst of the Paradise of God."

said, "I go to prepare a place for you; "not the best and greatest of the sons of men, not the highest angels, but I, the eternal Son of the Father, very God of very God, I, who was promised to Adam in Paradise, for him and his posterity, to bruise the serpent's head, and raise them out of their fall ;-I, who was the joy of Abraham, and the object of his faith and hope, as that seed of his, in whom all the families of the earth should be blessed ;-I, David's Son and Lord, to sit on his throne and order it with judgment and with justice; I, foretold by Moses and all the prophets as the deliverer of mankind, and whose name is Jesus, to save his people from their sins; I, who in the fulness of time took your nature into the Godhead, to redeem, purge, and sanctify it; I, who in your flesh made satisfaction to justice, paid your debt, bore your curse, and fulfilled all righteousness; who in all I did and suffered, was your substitute and representative by covenant with the Father, lived and died for your justification, merited for you the forgiveness of sins, peace and sonship;-who for the suffering of death, in your stead and for your sakes, have all power in heaven and earth, given unto me, "I ascend unto my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God;" "I go to prepare a place for you." If you cast a longing eye towards the blessed place, and wish to have your everlasting portion in it, but at the same time are oppressed with a sense of guilt, and find it a dead weight upon your spirits, dismiss your fears, it is your home and in. heritance by the will of God, by the grace of adoption, by right of purchase. Look unto Jesus. Let us still dwell upon the word I. "I," says he, will come again and receive you to myself.' I, who saw your distress and the misery of your condition long before you were born, and came into

We all join in best wishes to you and yours, I am your assured friend in the best bonds, JOHN THORNTON.

There is a liberty unsung By poets, and by senators unpraised; 'Tis liberty of heart derived from Heaven, Bought with His blood who gave it to mankind.

COWPER.

The Writer of this little narrative has been induced to forward it for publication, in the hope that, at a period when numbers are daily adding to the reformed churches, it may be useful to some to trace the steps a convert trod in the way to the heavenly

Canaan.

Dublin, 1827.

ELEANOR was the eldest daughter of respectable parents, and in mind and person all that anxious and worldly-minded persons might wish their child to be. The first happy season of childhood passed by her without even a murmuring of that storm which afterwards gathered round her but the calm only lasted during the morning hour; far before the tender plant seemed strong enough to resist the blast, the sky was overcast.

When only ten years old Eleanor, at the request of her grandmother, left her affectionate family to reside with her. Mrs. B. had always been regarded by her grandchildren as a heretic, for she was a Protestant, and they were Roman Catholics. Worldly motives induced her father to let little Eleanor live under her roof, for he knew she was not, though a strict Protestant herself, possessed of a proselyting disposition; and his child, young as she was, he believed to be in the language of his church, a good Christian.

That there are some, " who have a name to live when they are dead," is, however it may be ridiculed by the world, a lamentable truth: privileged and favoured as is the Pro.. testant Church, how many are there who included in it, scarcely know

or prize their privileges? A fountain closed to others is open to them, yet they neglect or dislike to draw water from it: it is their privilege to read the word of God, yet it is often suffered to lie unopened in their houses; their church is a scriptural, a spiritual church, it is founded not on Peter but on Christ; the stone which the builders of the

papal church refused, is of theirs "the head of the corner." Yet personal religion has, in some, little or no spirituality; and the language of their hearts is, alas, how often, that of the children of Belial to Saul, "How can this man save us?" Nay they may even boast of the sure foundation' of their church, yet depend for salvation on some other ground.

Though the feeling was not acknowledged, Eleanor's grandmother felt a secret satisfaction in the superiority she thought she possessed over her husband's family, in belonging to the Church of England; but of the extent of her advantages she was nevertheless ignorant. Of the great privilege of access to the sacred Scriptures, she availed herself, it is true, at stated periods, but the idea of taking them as a lamp to her feet and a light to her path," never entered her mind. She felt, I have said, a superiority over the members of the Roman church, but she boasted of never wishing to interfere with the religion of her neighbours; and on this principle, Eleanor was allowed to attend chapel regularly, to tell her beads morning and evening, to refrain from meat on stated days, and in short to adhere to the sundry forms and observances of her church, without a question or an expostulation.

About three years had passed quietly away, and Eleanor, instead of being in the least infected with heretical principles, was remarkable

for her zealous attachment to her church, and the strictness of her attention to its forms, when the death of a young friend gave a check to the gay thoughtlessness of youth, and excited the first movements of that inquiring disposition which never again rested in its march after truth. The young friends had been tenderly attached; and when Eleanor had received the parting kiss, and seen the departing spirit trembling on the quiver. ing lip, she was taken out of the room, and did not return until the solemn scene was over, and the remains of her youthful friend disposed in the usual way, and strewn with flowers. The face of the corpse was mild and sweet, and a smile might still seem to linger on the lip where it had dwelt in life. Eleanor looked at it with mingled sorrow and pleasure, and could not help fancying, from the calmness of the clayey tenement, that the soul which had inhabited it was in blessedness. "Oh! she is now a happy angel in heaven!" cried she, as she stooped to kiss the ice-cold lips. She will be so very soon, my dear," said an elderly friend who accompanied her; but her sins must be purged away first; she had few to atone for, to be sure; but the youngest and the best must be purified from their sins, before they can deserve the joys of heaven.' *

Eleanor turned again to the corpse, but it was with an altered, a trembling, doubting feeling. She asked herself, was it possible that her dear friend, instead of the happy state in which she had fancied her, was suffering the torments of purgatory? Was this probation requisite even for the infant who, except

* I am aware that this is not acknowledged as the general doctrine of the Roman church; it is mentioned only as existing in the belief of the subject of this narrative, and is also that which I have commonly found established among a certain class of persons in the communion of that church.

by inheritance, was sinless? She could not deny its necessity; but the pleasure with which she had regarded the placid countenance of her lifeless friend was changed, while she thought of it, to a cold, unhappy shuddering. She felt then what death was, and turned sickened and sad away.

That night Eleanor trembled when the image again presented itself, and she asked herself, Would none, however good, however pure, escape this purgatorial purification? No! she knew that every one was born in sin; she felt by the light of reason and nature, that "there is not a just man upon earth who doeth good and sinneth not," and revolting as was the idea, she was obliged to submit to the doctrine of her church concerning the purification of spirits after death. Eleanor lay long awake tormented by these thoughts, and at last only composed her mind with the pleasing hope of dying rich enough to leave large sums to offer masses for the speedy deliverance of her soul from its sufferings.

The ensuing Sabbath morn, Eleanor awoke as light and happy as usual; it was, alas! a day only joyful to her as that on which she was free from all the confinement and occupations which her grandmother's anxiety for her education imposed, and at liberty to enjoy her young acquaintance, and amusements. The old lady herself, was often ill, and on Sundays, when she could not go to church, the large old Bible was always placed on the parlour table before she came down stairs. When Eleanor entered the room to take her prayer book on her way to chapel, she laughed to see it thus laid in order, with the spectacles lying on the open leaf. She told me that so far from entertaining a serious thought on this memorable, though at the time apparently trivial incident, she pictured to herself the formal old lady performing her daily penance of reading a

chapter in the Bible. But while, with this idea, looking carelessly down the sacred page which she had not yet learned to revere, her eye fell on the words, "The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." "From all sin!" she repeated; then there is a way of cleansing sin beside the fire of purgatory." The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." Why did I never hear this before? Why did I not know it when I saw poor Julia die?

Eleanor became lost in thought; of the Saviour she had heard little, knew almost nothing. That he had died for the sins of the world, she learned when she learned any thing of the Christian religion, but she had also learned to think of His death as a partial sacrifice, offered as a means of assisting us to fit ourselves for the enjoyment of God's favour and the admission to his presence. She had not thought of it as purchasing for us admission into the Holiest uncoupled with the personal merit of the soul's suffering for its own sin in the intermediate state. She thought over the words which were thus brought before her, until forgetting her prejudices, for the first time in her life, she wished to read the word of truth.

Her grandmother came into the room while the wish was forming, and looking in surprise at Eleanor, she started up, and saying she would be late at prayers, left the house. During service her mind was engrossed with the passage she had read, and from time to time she would repeat to herself "the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin."-Then what need of further cleansing? she would say. Is it not sufficient? Can any sufferings equal His? But ah! conscience would whisper, what do you know of this soul-cleansing blood? Free, copious as is the stream, it may not yet have reached your soul, and never may cleanse it from

its sins. Eleanor did not know the Scriptures; she was therefore denied the comfort of the command and the promise, "Ask, and ye shall receive:" yet, in the multitude of her thoughts within her, the half-formed prayer was passing to her lips, Oh, my Saviour! she stopped, for a sudden awe came over her, and she substituted the more familiar address to heaven, 'Blessed Virgin, intercede for me!' Eleanor returned sad and dispirited; she had gone with the multitude of them that kept holyday,' but she did not return saying, "I have gone to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy." She had, it is true, gone through all the forms of devotion prescribed to the faithful; she had knelt and risen, and bowed and worshipped; she had prostrated herself before the image of Mary, and the crucifix, and been sprinkled with the consecrated water, yet she felt no spiritual benefit; after these and many more such things as these, she felt a want, which, if it had been defined, would have amounted to the secret longing of an oppressed spirit for the sprinkling of that "blood which speaketh better things than that of Abel." An undefined feeling, that she was in error, took possession of her mind; yet she did not know how to detect that error, or to free herself from it. It was one verse of holy writ had given her this idea, and though often warned against ' meddling with the Scriptures,' and though hitherto 'too good a catholic' to dare to read a Protestant Bible, Eleanor at length resolved to read for herself the book which she had heard was She

as

but for the priests alone.' had full opportunity to do so, after the stated hour her grandmother never required her's, and she could take it to her own room and replace it in the morning, without the old lady's suspecting its having been in such use.

To be continued.

MY DEAR SIR.-I am happy to hear that you and your partner are about to avail yourselves of the present delightful season, and seek for health and recreation by a few weeks absence from the cares of the family and the counting house. You have not mentioned whether your course is to be directed to the retired shades of the country, or the more general resort of the sea shore, or I might perhaps have ventured to suggest a few ideas with reference to the more appropriate improvement of your time, according to the circumstances under which you will probably be placed. Some remarks, however, are of so general a nature, that I trust you will excuse my stating them; and though many, or all of them, may have been anticipated, yet you will not therefore esteem them the less important, or complain that the views of your friend accord with your own.

It is, my dear Sir, the divine command, "Whether ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God; " and this command should ever be kept in view, and produce its corresponding effect on all our plans, whether of business or of pleasure. There are enjoyments and recreations, in which we may lawfully engage, and in which we may at once seek our own pleasure and advantage, promote the welfare of our fellow men, and glorify the Lord our God. Too many appear to lose sight of this union :-I trust that you and your partner are not of the number.

I have often been struck with observing that the large majority of professing Christians, in arranging their plans for a summer excursion, seem almost to lose sight of one most important topic of inquiry; namely, the religious privileges of the place to which they are going. The air, the country, the rides, the sands, the lodgings,

the provisions, the medical attendants, the company, are all canvassed again and again; but the ministry, the accommodation at places of worship,-the spiritual food, in short, seems almost entirely forgotten. The party is formed, the plan arranged, the lodgings secured, the journey engaged in; every thing goes on as smoothly as may be till Saturday night, or perhaps Sunday morning comes, and then the question is-Where shall we go? The church is a mile off, and we cannot walk; the chapel is so full, there is not even standing-room; this place is objectionable on one ground, and that on another; and thus the mind is disturbed and harrassed, the soul is left without food, and, while the body acquires renewed health and strength, the spiritual faculties become torpid and experience considerable injury.

Difficulties of this nature are sometimes unavoidable; and in adopting the most adviseable means for the renovation of health and strength, it is not always possible to secure those public means of grace which the soul would desire: when, however, the evil is foreseen, means may oft-times be adopted to counteract it; provision of suitable books may be made, and a plan arranged for the improvement of the Lord's Day, which, though very far inferior to the public ordinances of the sanctuary, may yet be pro portionably superior to the expedients which, for want of previous arrangement, we may be compelled to adopt. Where public worship can be attended on, it is an obvious duty, even though the discourses delivered may not meet with our entire approbation; but where such attendance is impracticable, there a more full and extended system of family worship should be introduced, which may well include