should be the silver thread running through the whole conduct of those whose fair and beautiful vocation it is to form the female character. That tenderness and consideration are far from being made, as a general rule, the principles of school discipline, the usual tone of our girls' schools for the lower classes abundantly testifies. Take, for example, the course ordinarily pursued with juvenile offenders; and say whether you can draw in your mind a picture of more injurious absurdity than the modes of punishment usually adopted? It is astonishing what ingenious devices for hardening the ductile mind and exasperating the wounded spirit are discovered by teachers, amiable and excellent it may be― but who are too ignorant of the science of mind to understand how easily the moral sense of their pupils may be hardened and stupified by their injudicious treatment; and how, when once injured, results the most lamentable are sure to follow.

We visited, some months ago, a school where a hundred girls are wont to assemble for daily instruction; and that visit rises to our recollection at this moment, as illustrative of the unstudied remarks which we venture to lay before our readers. We are of those who always feel a glow of pleasure on finding ourselves in the midst of a youthful throng; but we had not been many moments in that school-room, before the pleasurable feeling was exchanged for that of sorrowing, and, as we believe, righteous indignation. Two girls, about twelve or thirteen years of age, were standing on a form at the upper end of the room, having been placed there for the express purpose of being exposed to the gaze of every casual visitor, and of the juvenile multitude around, as a punishment for a fault which had been committed. The business of the school was proceeding as usual. No one seemed to feel that anything unpleasant was taking place--no shade of sorrow or compassion passed over the countenances of the youthful group-that two members suffered seemed to be no reason that other members should, in a measure, suffer with them—on the contrary, all was cold, hardened, and unfeeling. Nor could it indeed be expected that the general state of feeling should

be other than it was; for the two delinquents themselves, until we could no longer refrain from giving a somewhat different turn to the state of affairs—were smiling and whispering to each other, as little heeding the position in which they were placed, as they would have heeded a passing gust of wind on their morning's walk to school.

Guardians of mind! is it thus you work on the imperishable material submitted to your touch? Is it thus you exert your controlling and moulding influence? Alas! too often it is even so. Full well we know there are those who would have gazed with indifference on the scene we have briefly described, and said that all was as it should be. For ourselves, we must confess we could have wept in very pity to see the delicate texture of the female mind-that texture, which demands the nicest touches of the nicest art, thus rudely worked upon by rough, unskilful hands-the tender material torn and injured, it might be beyond the possibility of repair; and when we remember that this destructive and hardening process is not the exception, but the rule—that such practices prevail and abound in our schools, sanctioned too by the authority of those from whom better things might and ought to be expected, we may well desire to raise our voice, all feeble though it be, in grave and earnest reprehension. Alas, alas! when will our female youth be placed in abler hands, and governed by warmer hearts? We want no over-refinement, nor mistaken delicacy; but we do want our young girls, whether they be occupants of a princely mansion, or of a lowly cottage, to be gentle, modest, unobtrusive, loving, and sensitive; and we ask, whether it be possible, that the gentler and better feelings of our nature should be strengthened by a course of treatment such as that of which we speak? Will it cherish that delicacy of feeling, that modesty and sense of propriety which cast such a bright and beautiful halo round the female character; and which we all desire should be the possession of our English females, high and low, rich and poor? Will it create a moral susceptibility-excite to reflection, and lead to penitence? No; it will debase rather than elevate the character-it will harden rather than soften and sub

due-nip the tender shoots of virtue in many a sensitive mind, and harden into adamantine stone many a bold and reckless heart. Female educators! yours is a sacred trust, and our hearts bound towards you with feelings of peculiar interest.

Bear with us while we repeat our word of caution, and entreat you, as you would shield your charge in their coming years of womanhood from police-courts, gaols, and penitentiaries, to avoid everything which in their days of childhood might render them insensible to moral influence. See to it that you lower not the tone of right feeling in your schools, and be persuaded that the moral atmosphere breathed there by your children is far more important in its results, than the lessons of your books, or even your precepts and instructions.

(To be continued.)

MARY.

HEARTY WORK.

(An extract from a Sermon preached before a Congregation consisting chiefly of School Children.)

"And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men."-COLOSSIANS iii. 23.

We all know what is meant by doing a thing heartily, that is, from the heart. When a person says "the man's heart is in his work," we readily form a conception of such a man's character. We think of one who takes a lively interest in what he does, who spends many hours in anxious plans to compass his object, and who is very careful not to do any thing which may at all endanger the attainment of the end which he has in view. We never think, when we hear such a description, of one who goes about his business in a slovenly, sleepy, lifeless way; the words at once call up the ideas of energy, earnestness, painstaking, and concentration of every faculty on the work in hand.

'Doing a thing from the heart:" O we all know what that means. Is it not the throwing every energy of

mind and body into our appointed work? Is it not the driving away of considerations and matters with which we have no immediate business, and the fixing an undivided attention on the work in which we are engaged?

"This is my appointed work," such a hearty worker thinks. “This is my duty; therefore I ought not to throw away my energies and time on other matters. I have now my work to do, and I know I ought, if I do it at all, to strive to do it well. I will set about it in good earnest. I will have nothing to do with wandering thoughts and pursuits, however lawful they may be at other times, which would now have the effect of diverting my attention from my work. I will strain every nerve; I will direct my whole attention to do all I do in the best way I can.

I hope we all have experienced what such a feeling as this is. But St. Paul does not stop when he bids Christians to do their work heartily. He makes a very important addition to this advice. He says, "as to the Lord, and not unto men."

We must not merely do our work heartily: we must do it also from a high and Christian motive. A worldly man may do his work heartily. We may often see this —a close, undivided attention bestowed on business, and yet the heart all the while estranged from God. But it is peculiar to the Christian not merely to do his work heartily, but to do it from a Christian motive. He works as to the Lord, and not unto men." He is not contented to do a thing in such a way that men shall applaud him. He seeks to do every thing so as to please God. He knows that the Lord searches the heart. Of what avail, then, is a mere fair outside, while all within is rottenness? 66 My God," he thinks, "always sees me. I cannot think a thought but what he knows it. He sees me as I really am. He redeemed me with his own most precious blood. He ever watches over me with kind, unceasing care. His I am, and his I hope to be through the long ages of eternity. What folly, then, in me to care for any praise of men, if, by procuring it, I incur my God's censure! If my Saviour approves what I do, I am contented. For if I have that sweet peace of

mind which he is exalted to bestow, I have that which the world can neither give nor take away."

Let me endeavour to-day, in dependence upon God's blessing, to apply what has now been said to those young persons placed here for the purposes of education who constitute so large a portion of this congregation.

To them the text ought to come home with peculiar force.

I. How much precious time is wasted at school for want of doing the thing which we have in hand heartily! How often are lessons carelessly attended to, the earnest efforts of teachers rendered of little effect, and the whole work of school gone about in such a way that one would think the scholar's only aim was to have as little trouble as possible! How many young people seem to make it their leading object to study as little as they can manage to do without actually incurring punishment! Oh! how different is such a spirit as this from the hearty working of which St. Paul speaks. A young person is placed at school for the purpose of having his mind improved and fitted for properly discharging the duties in life to which God's providence has called him. Time at school is a precious talent. What would not many of those who are now grown-up give to be able to call back the years which they wasted in youth! How clearly do they now see the value of the advantages which they have forfeited by their folly! "Ah!" they often think, "had I my school-days to live over again, how differently would I spend them. I would not lose my time; I would number my hours, and carefully apportion to each its proper work. I would remember that I was sowing at school seed of which I should certainly reap the fruits for good or evil in after times."

Oh, my dear young friends, for more hearty, earnest exertion in whatever we set our hands to! Nor let us imagine that idleness, which implies a course of conduct the reverse of this, is a little sin. Well has it been said by him whose life was so earnestly dedicated to the great work of Christianizing our public schools, "Idleness and vice are considered as two distinct things; and it is very common to say, and to hear it said, of such an