how few are abundant in prayer ?-how few pray at all, with the heart, without which prayer is so much idle sound? That CHRIST will reveal Himself in His power to us-unless we walk more diligently in the old paths of Christian duty and Christian worship, it is idle to suppose. We deceive ourselves if we expect it. But, O! may God's grace stir up some of us to a more earnest piety— a stricter walk-a closer attendance to ordinances. May we seek CHRIST more diligently, may we keep His commandments more perfectly, that so He and His FATHER may (according to His promise) manifest themselves to us with a clearness, in which they never will manifest themselves to the careless world. FEELING AND DOING. (From "AMY HERBERT.") AMY.-And will you tell me, whilst I am working, what you had not time to speak about yesterday? I mean why it never does people any good to go and see others suffer merely from curiosity. "It not only does them no good, but it does them harm," replied Mrs. Herbert," and for this reason: GOD gives to almost every one, and especially to young people, many kind and amiable feelings, as a sort of treasure which they are carefully to keep: now these kind feelings, as people grow older, gradually die away as they get accustomed to the sight of suffering, and so at last they are likely to become cold and hard-hearted; and there is only one sure way of preventing this, by doing kind actions whenever we are blessed with kind feelings. Perhaps you would rather I should explain myself more clearly," added Mrs. Herbert, as Amy laid down her work, and looked thoughtfully in her mother's face. "When you saw Susan Reynolds yesterday, you had compassion for her, and a great wish to help her; this was the good feeling given you by GoD: but, supposing that you had thought that, after all, it was too much trouble to work for her, you would soon have forgotten her; and the next time you saw her, you would probably have pitied her less, and the next time less still, and if you had gone on so, you might have ended in becoming perfectly cold and selfish; but by determining to do something you have kept up your interest; and you will find that your kind feeling will continue and increase, not only for her, but for other persons you may see in distress." 66 "But then I have heard you say, mamma, that we ought not to follow our feelings entirely." "No," replied Mrs. Herbert; "because very often our feelings are wrong, and, therefore, we must have some other rule to go by, or we shall continually mistake our duties; but when they are right, they are given us by GoD, to make those duties easy and pleasant; and if we do not encourage them, we shall find when we grow old, that it will be very difficult, if not almost impossible, to do right, however we may wish it." "Then, mamma, if we had always good feelings, there would be no occasion to do any thing but just what we felt inclined: how very nice that would be." "There is but one way of getting these good feelings," said Mrs. Herbert, "and that is by doing what we know we ought, whether we like it or not; and only one of keeping them when we have got them, by taking care always to act upon them; and if we begin when we are young, it is astonishing how easy it will soon become. I know you like an illustration, Amy, to make you remember things; so now I will give you one, to teach you the difference between feelings and duty. Feelings are like the horses which carry us quickly and easily along the road, only sometimes they stumble, and sometimes they go wrong, and now and then they will not move at all; but duty is like the coachman who guides them, and spurs them up when they are too slow, and brings them back when they go out of the way." FORM AND SPIRIT. THERE are too many, GoD knoweth, who have nothing left of religion, but the outward form and appearance. They come to church with a solemn countenance, and send their children thither to be baptized, and think it necessary to appear at the LORD's table; and so far as Christianity is a form, are willing enough to be saved by it; while it appears too plainly, that no doctrine of their religion has any share in their affections, because it seldom or never makes any part in their conversation. When we hear or speak of worldly things, we may perceive that they are in earnest; but if they submit to hear of heavenly things once a week within the walls of the Church, nothing further is to be expected of them. And this empty shell of religion, they think, is as much as any prudent person ought to pretend to, unless he will run the hazard of being reputed a Methodist. The true state of the case is this. He that would be saved from the penalties of sin in the world to come, must first be saved from the dominion of it in this world. GOD hath therefore demanded of us the service of the heart; and all the external forms of religion are designed as a body, of which faith, devotion, and love to GoD and man, are the soul and spirit. "He is a Jew," said the Apostle, "who is one inwardly;" and we may affirm him to be a Christian, who, with the spirit as well as with the body, serves that God who is the FATHER of them both.-Jones of Nayland.-Letter to a Young Gentleman. "Give all thou canst: high Heaven rejects the lore Wordsworth. EVEN with respect to heavenly things, let discretion be our guide-let us not soar too high, let our greatest ambition be to have continually before our eyes CHRIST crucified, to know the particulars of His life and death, and what He requires of us. Beyond this let us not seek any thing, and we shall please that Divine Master, whose true disciples ask nothing of Him, but what may contribute to their doing His holy will. The Spiritual Combat. THE CHURCH IN THE COLONIES. No. 6. CANADA. THE following extracts from the Journal of a visitation through parts of his Diocese, by the bishop of Montreal, will show in a striking light the difficulties with which that infant Church has to struggle : "On the 7th, I re-crossed the St. Lawrence, and west of the Rivière du Loup Mission, still in the Roman Catholic tracts of country. On Sunday the eighth, I confirmed six persons in the diminutive stone Church. On the 10th, Mr. Guérout, whose guest I was, drove me to Lake Maskinongé, twenty-four miles, chiefly through the woods, by a road barely admitting the passage of the vehicle. The next day I confirmed eight persons here in a farm house: fifty or upwards were present, about the same number as that which had assembled at the Rivière du Loup Church on Sunday. They are a plain simple people, who appreciate the care of their pastor; but they are much connected with the Romanists, by intermarriage and familiar intercourse in life." DIFFICULTY OF TRAVELLING IN CANADA. "Mr. GUÉROUT took me on, on the 11th, to proceed by St. Elizabeth, where we slept, and Kildare, to Rawdon, which, with its dependencies, is the Mission of Mr. Bourne. A thaw had now continued for some days, accompanied by occasional heavy rain, and very extraordinary at this season of the year, so that the roads were most intolerably bad, and we were repeatedly upset. In the tract of country in which we were now travelling, which is more or less rude and unfrequented, and in which the winter track, as is often the case in Canada East, was in many places carried through the fields, away from the summer road, we encountered brooks and ditches, which had broken their confinement, and were so swollen with continual augmentations from the melting snow, as to offer some obstruction to our passage across them. The driver of the sleigh' which followed us, would here go forward with a pole, to sound the depth; but when it was ascertained that we could pass, which we did in every instance but one, when a circuit of some miles became necessary, it was a matter of very nice arrangement to prevent upsetting, the bottom being very unequal and broken up. In some places the driver only could go, it being necessary that he should stand up and balance the vehicle in its passage. Here the rest of the party crossed on foot, upon rails, which the country people had laid together for that purpose, taken from the fences; or we had recourse to the fences themselves as a footbridge, holding on by the upper rail, and moving our feet along a lower one. In one place Mr. Guérout's little low runnered cariole, called a Verlina, was floating. These scenes brought forcibly to mind that passage in the 147th Psalm, when, after describing 2 Sledge. |