lief of want; and it is in virtue of a generous desire on the part of a poor man, when this money is refused; when, with the feeling that his necessities do not just warrant him to be yet a burden upon others, he declines to touch the offered liberality; looked-for proposal, he still resolves to put it for the present away, and to find, if possible, for himself a little longer; when, standing on the very margin of dependence, he would yet like to struggle with the difficulties of his situation, and to maintain this severe but honourable conflict, till hard necessity should force him to surrender.

when, with a delicate recoil from the un

Let

Chalmers addresses himself throughout the whole of this sermon, that we should think it must compel the assent almost as certainly as the atgraded from the honest pride of their tention of all that are not entirely deforefathers. After a few more paragraphs, there occurs the following beautiful and philosophical passage.

"We have no conception whatever, that, even in millennial days, the diversities of wealth and station will at length be equalizOn looking forward to the time when

ed.

shifted from himself take some new direction to another; and who, we ask, is the giver of it? The first and most obvious reply is, that it is he who owned it but it is still more emphatically true, that it is he who has declined it. It came originally

out of the rich man's abundance; but it was the noble-hearted generosity of the poor man that handed it onwards to its final destination. He did not emanate the gift; but it is just as much that he has not absorbed it, but left it to find its full conveyance to some neighbour poorer than himself, to some family still more friendless and destitute than his own. It was given the first time out of an overflowing fulness. It is given the second time out of stinted and self-denying penury. In the world's eye, it is the proprietor who bestowed the charity. But in Heaven's eye, the poor man who waived it from himself to another is the more illustrious philanthropist of the two. The one gave it out of his affluence. The other gave it out of the sweat of his brow. He rose up early, and sat up late, that he might have it to bestow on a poorer than himself; and without once stretching forth a giver's hand to the necessities of his brethren, still it is possible, that by him, and such as him, may the main burden of this world's benevolence be borne.

"It need scarcely be remarked, that, without supposing the offer of any sum made to a poor man who is generous in his desires, he, by simply keeping himself back from the distributions of charity, fulfils all the high functions which we have now ascribed to him. He leaves the charitable

fund untouched for all that distress which is more clamorous than his own; and we, therefore, look, not to the original givers of the money, but to those who line, as it were, the margin of pauperism, and yet firmly refuse to enter it we look upon them as the pre-eminent benefactors of society, who narrow, as it were, by a wall of defence, the ground of human dependance, and are, in fact, the guides and the guardians of all that opulence can bestow.

There is something so truly Scottish in the feelings to which Dr

queens the nursing-mothers of our church, we think that we can behold the perspective of as varied a distribution of place and property as before. In the pilgrimage of life, there will still be the moving procession of the few charioted in splendour on the highway, and the many pacing by their side along the line of the same journey.There will, perhaps, be a somewhat more elevated footpath for the crowd; and there will be an air of greater comfort and sufficiency amongst them; and the respectability of evident worth and goodness will sit upon the countenance of this general population. But, bating these, we look for no great change in the external aspect of society. It will only be a moral and a spiritual change. Kings will retain their sceptres, and nobles their coronets; but, as they float in magnificence along, will they look with benignant feeling on the humble wayfarers; and the honest salutations of regard and reverence will arise to them back again; and, should any weary passenger be ready to sink unfriended on his career, will he, at one time, be borne onwards by his fellows on the pathway, and, at another, will a shower of beneficence be made to descend from the crested equipage that overtakes him. It is Utopianism to think, that, in

the ages of our world which are yet to come, the outward distinctions of life will not all be upholden. But it is not Utopianism, it is Prophecy to aver, that the breath of a new spirit will go abroad over the great family of mankind-so, that while, to the end of time, there shall be the high and the low in every passing generation, will the charity of kindred feelings, and of a common understanding, create a fellowship between them on their way, till they reach that heaven where human love shall be perfected, and all human greatness is unknown."

The two passages we have quoted occur in one and the same sermon, about the middle of the volume. Yet we think those who read the work attentively, will not hesitate to agree with us in considering them as furnishing the best key to the general purpose of the author in the whole of its speculations. It is clear that, to

reconcile the poor, on the one hand, to that which is inseparable from the arrangement of all human society; i. e. to the want of much that they see possessed by others;—and, on the other hand, to impress on the minds of their superiors the vast obligation to active benevolence and kindness which is inseparably attached to the secure possession of what circumstances have plac ed in their hands-has, throughout, been the chief purpose of his writing. He has looked upon the errors of rich and poor alike, with the eye of a compassionate philosopher-that is, of a christian. He has no difficulty in excusing the delusions of the ignorant who

"admire they know not whatAnd know not whom-but as one leads the

other."

And yet even of these he speaks calmly-we had almost said tolerantly; for it is probable that he is of the same opinion which was twenty years ago finely expressed by Mr Coleridge viz. that "the great majority of democrats are persons who have attained the same sort of knowledge in politics which infidels have in religion" -a most philosophical view surely a view of perfect truth-a view equally worthy of the high reflective genius of Coleridge, and the christian wisdom of Dr Chalmers. It is de lightful to see how well the speculations of these two great thinkers-men who have, we dare say, never seen each other-and whose tastes are so different, that they probably have never thought much of each otherit is truly delightful to see how well they harmonize in regard to this great subject of philosophical interest.Listen to Coleridge-the words were spoken long ago-but, alas! the day is not near when they are likely to be heard out of place.

"By what means can the lower classes be made to learn their duties, and urged to practise them? The human race may perhaps possess the capability of all excellence; and truth, I doubt not, is omnipotent to a

mind already disciplined for its reception; but assuredly the over-worked labourer, skulking into an ale-house, is not likely to exemplify the one, or prove the other. In which the present state of society exhibits, that barbarous tumult of inimical interests, religion appears to offer the only means universally efficient. The perfectness of future men is indeed a benevolent tenet, and may operate on a few visionaries, whose studious habits supply them with employment, and seclude them from temptation. But a distant prospect, which we are never to reach, will seldom quicken our footsteps, however lovely it may appear; and a blessing which

not ourselves but posterity are destined to enjoy, will scarcely influence the actions of any still less of the ignorant, the prejujudiced, and the selfish.

"Go preach the GOSPEL to the poor.' By its simplicity it will meet their comprefections, by its precepts it will direct their hension, by its benevolence soften their af conduct, by the vastness of its motives ensure their obedience. The situation of the

poor is perilous: they are indeed both

"from within and from without Unarmed to all temptations." Prudential reasonings will in general be powerless with them. For the incitements of this world are weak in proportion as we are wretched—

The world is not my friend, nor the world's law,
The world has got no law to make me rich.

They too, who live from hand to mouth, will most frequently become improvident. Possessing no stock of happiness they eagerly seize the gratifications of the moment, and snatch the froth from the wave as it passes by them. Nor is the desolate state of their families a restraining motive, unsoftened as they are by education, and benumbed into selfishness by the torpedo touch of extreme want. Domestic affections depend on association. We love an object if, as often as we see or recollect it, an agreeable sensation arises in our minds. But alas! how should he glow with the charities of father and husband, who, gaining scarcely more than his own necessities demand, must have been accustomed to regard his wife and children, not as the soothers of finished labour, but as rivals for the insufficient meal! In a man so circumstanced ered only by the ten-fold mightiness of the the tyranny of the Present can be overpowFuture. Religion will cheer his gloom with her promises, and by habituating his mind to anticipate an infinitely great Revolution hereafter, may prepare it even for the sudden reception of a less degree of amelioration in this world.*

But we must return to Dr Chalmers: -and we think we cannot do better than select some of those specimens of his best style, which may be found

tent of them, there is not an individual among you, who has a title to construe the assertion into an affronting charge of criminality against himself. But you surely know, as well as we, that the mercantile profession, conducted, as it often is, with the purest integrity, and laying no resistless necessity whatever for the surrender of principle on any of its members; and dignified by some of the noblest exhibitions of untainted honour, and devoted friendship, and magnificent generosity, that have ever been recorded of our nature;-you know as well as we, that it was utterly extravagant, and in the face of all observation, to affirm, that each, and every one of its numerous competitors, stood clearly and totally exempted from the sins of an undue selfishness. And, accordingly, there are certain commodious falsehoods occasionally practised in this department of human affairs. There are, for example, certain dextrous and gainful evasions, whereby the payers of tribute are enabled, at times, to make their escape from the eagle eye of the exactors of tribute. There are even certain contests of ingenuity between individual traders, where, in the higgling of a very keen and anxious negociation, each of them is tempted, in talking of offers and prices, and the reports of fluctuations in home and foreign markets, to say the things which are not. You must assuredly know, that these, and such as these, then, have introduced a certain quantity of what may be called shuffling, into the communications of the trading worldinsomuch, that the simplicity of yea, yea, and nay, nay, is in some degree exploded; and there is a kind of understood toleration established for certain modes of expression, which could not, we are much afraid, stand the rigid scrutiny of the great day; and

there is an abatement of confidence between man and man, implying, we doubt, such a proportionate abatement of truth, as goes to extend most fearfully the condemnation that is due to all liars, who shall have their part in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone. And who can compute the effect of all this on the young and yet unpractised observer? Who does not see, that it must go to reduce the tone of his principles; and to involve him in many a delicate struggle between the morality he has learned from his catechism, and the morality he sees in a counting-house; and to obliterate, in his mind, the distinctions between right and wrong; and, at length, to reconcile his conscience to a sin which, like every other, deserves the wrath and the curse of God; and to make him tamper with a direct commandment, in such a way, as that falsehoods and frauds might be nothing more

in his estimation, than the peccadilloes of an innocent compliance with the current practices and moralities of the world? Here, then, is a point, at which the way of those who conform to this world, diverges from the way of those peculiar people who are

and are

redeemed from all iniquity, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. Here is a grievous occasion to fall. Here is a competition between the service of God and the service of Mammon. Here is the exhibition of another offence, and the bringing forward of another temptation, to those who are entering on the business of the world, little adverted to, we fear, by those who live in utter carelessness of their own souls, and never spend a thought or a sigh about the immortality of others-but most distinctly singled out by the text as a crime of foremost magnitude in the eye of Him who judgeth righteously.

Such are the general views of this book, which cannot fail to increase, great as it has long been, the fame of Dr Chalmers. We cannot conclude, however, without expressing our regret, that a work so admirably adapted for making a great and powerful impression on the minds of all thinking men, should have been disfigured -we can in conscience use no slighter word-by the introduction of not a few passages in which the excellent general principles of the author's reasoning are pushed to an extreme, that we should fear may be productive of no good effect whatever; but on the contrary, tend to throw very considerable discredit on his authority. The reader, who has perused the passage last quoted with such pleasure as its beauties, both of thought and expression, are calculated to convey, will in all likelihood feel hurt and mortified, when on turning over another page or two, he comes upon a piece of declamation, apparently quite as grave and earnest, concerning that most stale and hackneyed of all the topics of Christian Instructors, Religious Monitors, Evangelical Magazines, et hoc genus omne,— the sin of making our servants say, "not at home," when we happen to be disinclined for the reception of company. It is really mortifying to think, that such a man as Dr Chalmers should permit his mind to be seriously occupied, even for the number of minutes necessary

to write down the words of such a passage, with a subject, which almost every human being that reads the book, must consider so utterly unworthy of his intellect. There are enough surely, and to spare, of good simple men and women, whom there can be no harm in permitting to groan, since such is there good will and pleasure, over such enormities as this. But Dr Chalmers should not

told by the author's own bookseller, when he advertises, "Dr Chalmers's New Volume."

trifle so either with himself or his 'readers. The person who objects to the use of a phrase, so perfectly understood on all hands, in order to preserve any appearance of consistency, should without all question become a Quaker at once. Indeed we cannot conceive upon what principle, he can overlook for a single moment, the horrible iniquity of addressing an individual by a plural pronoun-to say nothing of the gross idolatry implied in the use of such names as, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday-or the virtual lie

It is a pity that such things should have been permitted to make their appearance, in pages of which they are so little worthy. But we have already said and quoted far more than enough, to shew that these are but the " paucæ maculæ," by which no man of sense will permit himself to be discouraged from an attentive perusal of an original, philosophical, and most eloquent book.

We have seldom met with any productions calculated to give a more engaging idea of their author's character, than "the Widow of Nain," and "the Outlaw of Taurus;"-two poems which - have lately been published by Mr Dale, of Bene't College, Cambridge. : The notions usually connected with the name of academical poetry, are such, that it is no wonder we threw these little volumes aside at first, without_bestowing on them more than a very hasty glance. But if any of our readers have, from similar prejudices, been induced to treat Mr Dale with similar disrespect, we beg leave to assure them that the loss is their own. His poetry is in truth the very reverse of what is usually produced in colleges: His style, indeed, bears all the marks of that easy unlaboured elegance, which can only be acquired after very long and intimate acquaintance with the models of classical antiquity; but it is totally free from all the coldnesses of pedantic imitation; and the spirit that animates its numbers, is no other than that of keen human feeling, exalted and adorned by the impressions of a piety as tender as it is deep.-We regard what the author has published as chiefly valuable on account of the promise it unfolds; but, even if he were never to

publish another line, he has already done enough to secure for his name the admiration of affectionate remembrance, among all that are worthy of reading poetry. He has touched with a hand of so much gentle power, some

of the finest strains of emotion that have place within the human breast, that none such can lay down his little volumes without feelings of the warmest personal kindliness towards the poet himself;-while the many, who like the woman of Nain, have wept over the sole props of their widowhood;-and the more who, like the Outlaw of Taurus, have known what it is to experience the horrors of remorse, and to shed the tears of repentance-will engrave on their memories, almost without an effort, the beautiful lines that must equally surprise and delight them, with showing how surely the soul of genius can divine the deepest secrets of the troubled heart.

The picture of the last death-bed scenes, in the house of Nain,-when the lonely woman watches-almost without one ray of hope-beside the patient victim of decay-is one that we are sure will justify all we have said.

The spirit of her son to cheer,

With hopes, she now had ceased to feel; From that dread stroke, which menaced near, A few short bitter days to steal : To soothe the languor of decay

She strove all other cares were fled;
And midnight's gloom, and morning's ray,
Still found her watching by his bed,
To render, with unwearied hand,

All love could do, or pain demand.
The very firmness of despair
Had nerved her weaker heart to bear;
Or never had that mother borne

To see him die-and thus to die-
Untimely wasting, ere the morn