unquestionable advantage of peace, health, life, and the other good things they part with; but they venture upon doing and suffering freely, and of choice, upon a sober, rational consideration of the advantage of cleaving to their religion, and of its being such as will do more than compensate any loss they can sustain for it. Again: they bear witness to the concerns of this religion as to a thing that they have not received upon bare hearsay, but upon narrow scrutiny, as that whereof they have the experience. They do not only give this testimony when it is new to them, but after long trial, when they are most sedate and composed, when they can expect nothing of advantage by it, and when they must lay their account with contempt, opposition, and loss. They give this testimony in whatever place they are,-where it is honoured, or where it is opposed. They give it with the greatest concern, and recommend this religion to those whom they would least deceive, even with their dying breath, when they dare not dissemble; and that after a long trial, in the course of their lives, in the great variety of outward condition, sufficient to have discovered the weakness of their religion, if it had any. They have made choice of this religion, and adhered to it, under the greatest outward disadvantages, who were not prepossessed in its favour by education, but prejudiced against it; and they have embraced it, where they had a free choice to accept or reject it, and advantages to tempt them to a refusal. They do not require an exquisite belief, as Mahometans do; but provoke to experience and trial.— Thomas Halyburton, on Deism.

CHAPEL BUILDING, VIEWED IN RELATION TO
CONNEXIONAL INCREASE.

(To the Editor of the Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine.)

THE spiritual condition of our large towns, and especially of the metropolis, is now forcing itself on the attention of all serious and sensible men. Scarcely an Episcopal Charge is delivered, but we observe a pensive tone with regard to the difference of ratio between the continued and mighty increase of our urban population, and the accommodation afforded for worshipping God and hearing the Gospel. The rulers of the Church of England call for new churches, and new churches are built with a rapidity and zeal unknown in this country before; and yet streets and peopled districts arise and stretch far beyond the tardy advances of God's people, in bringing and establishing among them the ministry of the word. Where the Gospel is truly preached in its fulness and freeness, and by a spiritual ministry, the churches are as certainly filled to overflowing, as they are built; but where Tractarian and ultra High-Church teachers celebrate their cold service, the place is comparatively deserted; and then the finger of scorn is so often pointed to the fact, that there are more places of worship than there are people who care to attend them. Thus have unbelief and Popery always played into each other's hands; but it is a pity that evangelical Christians should leave these cold-hearted and sceptical worldlings in quiet possession of their taunting argument. All ecclesiastical history proves that, in whatever place a vital Gospel has been tolerated and preached, there attendants and hearers have never been wanting. It seems to be a standing law of Christ's mediatorial government, that wherever the HEALING SIGN is lifted up, there shall be abundance of the dying around who are

glad to look and live. Such men as Mr. Noel, Mr. M'Neile, Mr. Stowell, in the Establishment; and Mr. Sherman, Dr. Leifchild, and Mr. James, among the Dissenters; never want deeply-interested hearers: while St. Leonard's, Shoreditch, and the Puseyite Bethnal-Green churches, only ring with hollow echoes. Alas! that there should be in our great towns, and especially in London, so many places of worship like these last mentioned; which are altogether unattended by the poor, and only frequented at all by a scanty group drawn from the wealthy and the higher part of the middle class, whom a regard for the established decencies of life prevents from neglecting the form of religion utterly. We have to thank worldliness and Romanism for these half-empty churches, while a million and a quarter of human beings are living and dying around, absolute strangers to God and to his house.

When Methodism, however, has endeavoured to supply its quota towards meeting this spiritual destitution, it has never been hampered by this lastmentioned circumstance. Its pulpits have never given forth an uncertain sound; the great evangelical doctrines have always been delivered thence with clearness, power, and success; and, in consequence, its town chapels, especially if builded in open and public situations, have never wanted congregations. No matter how few serious people resided in the neighbourhood, hundreds of individuals have been drawn within their walls under the influence of various motives, who, though dark and worldly at first, were interested, impressed, and subsequently converted, and settled there for life. The writer hardly knows of an exception with which to modify or guard this general statement. Why, then, does not the Methodist body, encouraged by its own history, and by the sanction of God, follow this fruitful, this soul-saving, vocation, by building commodious, chastelyfinished, and moderately large chapels, with LIGHT DEBT, in the midst of our dense town-districts; thus leading the way for the extension of the Christian ministry, and the diffusion of truth and righteousness? The answer has been, that it wanted means; but that answer may afford room for deep and painful meditation. Special societies or Circuits may have wanted means; but the statement can hardly have been truly put in the universal form. When Mr. Watson wrote the Life of Mr. Wesley, he could say, that the Wesleyans possessed as many places of worship as amounted to nearly half the number of parish churches in the kingdom; but, since that time, there is reason to believe that extension in the Establishment, as far as the building of places of worship is concerned, has been proceeding in a higher proportion. No one can seriously say, that the Wesleyans do not need more chapels. A century and more has rolled over since the great work of Methodism began; and yet we have no chapel in the City of London, but the neat little place in Jewin-street, which will scarce seat five hundred people, and which many pass without noticing. In the First Circuit, the chapels of City-road, Wilderness-row, and the above mentioned, can hardly allow of a tenth of their pew-room to strangers and noncommunicants, supposing all the society, with the Sunday-scholars, to be present. In the Sixth Circuit, which embraces the ever-extending western suburb, ranging from Kensington-gardens north-westward, with the dense streets and squares of the West-end,—a mass of cities, the want of chapels is still more painfully felt. Hinde-street, Milton-street, Stanhope-street chapels, though consecrated by many hallowed circumstances and triumphs of grace, are all narrow and confined places, barely sufficient to accommo

date those families, the members of which, in whole or in part, are in communion with us. To provide for an accession of new-comers, is out of the question; even members of the same household have to be separated, in order to be accommodated with sittings. In this way we might glance around the eight metropolitan Circuits, and continue a similar course of observation; and, no doubt, in many of the provincial towns, especially Liverpool and Manchester, this state of things is nearly approached.

It may be objected, on the part of some, that several minor, or third-rate, chapels, even in London, are not yet, however, filled. The answer is, These buildings are on such a contracted scale; are situate in such a background and obscure locality; often so mean, and void of all appliances of just taste, and of provision for that small degree of comfort which is neces

sary for the repose of the mind; and so ill ordered with psalmody, and the

like; that they awaken no attention, and draw few hearers but those who are already pious, and who cleave to the chapel of the locality from a sense of duty. These chapels never will be filled to overflowing; but experience has shown, that where they have been succeeded by larger and more commodious places of worship, in a more open and visible situation, a new congregation has been created: a large accession of strangers to the congregation has raised the spirits and fanned the zeal of those who formed its nucleus; the ordinances have been administered with deeper interest; and the work of the Lord has proceeded. Before Albion-street chapel, in Leeds, was given up, with a view to the building of another in its stead, more than one-third of its pews were vacant; but when Oxford-place chapel was completed, and took its congregation, such an addition was realized, that although this latter was double the size of its predecessor, it was nearly filled from the beginning. Instances of similar expansion might be quoted from St. Peter's and Wesley chapels, Leeds; from Derby, Nottingham, Boston, Lincoln, Hull, and other places; as well as from the few which Methodist history will supply from the metropolis: but they need not be specified; nor need they be wondered at; for all this only illustrates a settled course of procedure in the Redeemer's plan of reducing and recovering the world; namely, his own people must bring meat into his house,must offer their offering, put forth their effort, and pour their prayer,before the "windows of heaven" are opened, and the blessing is sent. We have no right to expect this order to be reversed.

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It has been matter of deep and painful interest to us, during the last few years, that our connexional increase has been so small; and God forbid that the writer, or any concerned, should cease to lay this matter to heart; and in reference to any apprehended hinderance, through unfaithfulness, of the Spirit's convincing and converting power and grace, should cease to ask, Lord, is it I?" yet still it would be a marvel of no common order, if, in the present state of things, the increase were large. We want to get access to a fresh portion of the population, yet unevangelized, and yet unregenerate. How else can sinners be awakened and brought to God, and to communion with his people? The few in our chapels who are now non-members, have been so for years, and perhaps will never be otherwise. When a new chapel has been raised, a good congregation gathered, and a certain proportion of that congregation (and I am willing to concede it should be a large one) is gathered into actual Christian fellowship, then increase stops, and it is time to go and build elsewhere, and colonize your Christianity. Will it not be conceded, that if there were to be a sovereign

and abundant pouring out of the Spirit from on high, and a general awakening realized as its consequent, that a larger provision of chapel-room would be absolutely needed? or, in plainer words, that if God were to grant immediately a full and literal answer to our prayer, we are not exactly in a condition to receive the answer? Seeing, then, that the Spirit is always given, that the preaching of the Gospel is always "the power of God unto salvation," that the Intercessor is always heard, and that the Father is through him always willing to receive and save sinners,-is it not the most humble, confiding, loving, yea, the most evangelical, course, to prepare our place, and then wait upon God, and say, " Arise, O Lord, into thy restingplace!" rather than require him to wait upon us, desiring him to save men first, that we may provide chapels after? To expect that the converts of an anticipated awakening will bring with them their own means of churchextension, is to expect that the Head of the church will furnish more money without appealing to our own sense of obligation; that he will not detract from-yea, that he will rather increase-that store of ours which yet we have not faithfully learned to use. If reservations like these lie at the heart of our prayers for prosperity, such prayers may be among those which God will not hear; or which, if heard, could only be answered or rewarded openly to the confusion of the offerer.

And now with regard to means. It is true, our continual and necessary contraction and multiplying of Circuits has the effect of diminishing the resources of each Circuit for building its own chapels, inasmuch as the number of its monied and able members is decreased. This may suggest the need of some mode of applying the connexional principle, especially with regard to London, the heart both of the country and the Connexion; though of which I can now give neither draft nor detail; but that the Wesleyans, as a body, are unable to take a step in supplying the crying spiritual wants of our great town populations, is what surely cannot be thought or asserted. It is said, by those who ought to be well-informed on the subject, that the Wesleyans were never more wealthy than now; and surely a people who could raise £200,000 in the Centenary period, without causing a single cry of distress, or wavering for a moment in the subsequent support of other Funds, can do something on an approximating scale towards the furtherance of Christ's kingdom in England, before another century shall have run its round, and swept its hundreds of millions into eternity. In London the state of the case is most affecting. Here, where Methodism has been boldly and energetically administered, it has succeeded; and perhaps there is no place in the land in which, if so administered, it would succeed better. The conviction of this truth is arousing some in London to a movement in the right direction, and they are blessed and encouraged in their deed; but in the whole land a vast field for enterprise and zeal lies before our people.

These remarks, Mr. Editor, are offered with great plainness and candour; but they represent not only my own, but the opinions of many intelligent and good men around me. I presume not to offer or suggest plans of action: my object is simply to stir up thought on this subject; and thought, especially in Christian minds, is such a germinant and mighty thing, it usually leads to action. I have a conviction that the intelligent laity of the Connexion will apply their business-talents, as well as their zeal for Christ, to this matter, and that the world will reap the result. Rather, however, than this letter should be the means of checking sacred jealousy as to the state of our individual piety, or of attributing the stationary character of

our present Christianity to anything rather than a want of personal faith, love, and prayer,-this hand should assuredly burn what, with a different anticipation, and great deference, I submit for insertion in your pages. ALPHA.

FAMILY GOVERNMENT.

THERE is, in some households, no family government, no order, no subordination. The children are kept under no restraint, but are allowed to do what they like; their faults are unnoticed and unpunished, and their tempers allowed to grow wild and headstrong; till, in fact, the whole family becomes utterly lawless, rebellious against parental authority, and unamiable to all around them. How many have had to curse the overindulgence of fond and foolish parents! How many, as they have ruminated amidst the desolations of poverty, or the walls of a prison, have exclaimed, "O, my over-fond parents, had you exercised that authority with which God intrusted you over your children, and had you checked my childish corruptions, and punished my boyish disobedience; had you subjected me to the salutary restraint of wholesome laws, I had not brought you with a broken heart to your grave, nor myself with a ruined character to the jail."

Over-indulgence is awfully common, and continually making shocking ravages in human character. It is a system of great cruelty to the children, to the parents themselves, and to society. This practice proceeds from various causes: in some instances, from a perverted and systematic sentimentalism; in others, from absolute indolence, and a regard to present ease, which leads the silly mother to adopt any means of coaxing, and yielding, and bribing, to keep the young rebels quiet for the time; in others, from mistake as to the time when restraint should begin, a spirit of procrastination, which leads parents to say, "I shall take them in hand by and by: there is no time lost; when their reason is a little more matured, I shall lay upon them more restraint;" and in some it is "mere animal affection," without the guidance of a particle of judgment,—a mere instinct, like that which, in the irrational tribes, leads to a blind and busy care. is not uncommon for parents to treat the first acts of puerile rebellion rather as freaks to be smiled at, than as faults to be reformed. "O," says the mother, "it is only play: he will know better soon. He does not mean any harm I cannot chide him." No; and if the father, wiser than herself, does, she cries, and, perhaps, in the hearing of the child, reproves her husband for cruelty. From whatever cause it proceeds, it is in the highest degree injurious to the character of the children. Let those who are guilty of it read the fearful comment on this sin, which is furnished for their warning, in the history of Eli and his family.-Rev. John Angell James.

ROYAL MARRIAGE FEAST, CAIRO.

(To the Editor of the Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine.)

It

A FAVOURABLE opportunity occurred for my witnessing a festive scene in the royal hareem: a fantisea given in honour of the marriage of three ladies related to the Pasha. I was strongly pressed, by some of the royal ladies, to come and see the splendour of the brides."

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