414 
DEC. 25 
MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER: AN AGRICULTURAL AND FAMILY NEWSPAPER. 
PRAYER. 
BY MRS. LOUJSB TVORTHE3T. 
CHILDREN. 
*Y H. W. LONGFELLOW. 
Comb to me, O, ye children ! 
For I hear you at your play, 
And the questions that perplexed me 
Hare ranished quite away. 
Ye open the Eastern windows 
That look towards the sun, 
Where thoughts are singing swallows 
And the brooks of the morning ran. 
In your hearts are the birds and the sunshine, 
In your thoughts the brooklet’s flow, 
But in mine is the wind of Autumn, 
And the first fall of the snow. 
Ah t what would the world be to us 
If the children were no more ? 
We should dread the desert behind us 
Worse than the dark before. 
What the leaves are to the forest, 
With light and air for food, 
Ere their sweet and tender juices 
Have been hardened into wood,— 
That to the world are children ; 
Through them it feels the glow 
Of a brighter and sunnier climate 
Than reaches the trunks below. 
Come to me, 0, ye children 1 
And whisper in my ear 
What the birds and the winds are singing 
In your sunny atmosphere. 
For what are all our contrivings, 
And the wisdom of our books, 
When compared with your caresses, 
And the gladness of your looks ! 
Ye are better than all the ballads 
That ever were sung or Baid; 
For ye are living poems, 
And all the rest are dead. 
Written lor Moore's Rural New-Yorker. 
GLEANINGS-No. V. 
"What am I to have for my Christmas present, 
mamma?” 
" Are you snre you deserve one, my Bella?” que¬ 
ried the proud mother, smilingly. 
“Certainly, mamma. Your aching head will bear 
witness to my indefatigable drumming on yonder 
piano for the laBt six months; and my own cranium 
is painfully conscious of being crammed full of 
French verbs, algebra problems, etc. And, besides, 
mamma mine, you promised me a set of jewelry 
when I should arrive at the advanced age of six¬ 
teen years. I claim the fulfillment of that promise 
to-morrow,” and the fair young girl tripped out of 
the room. “How beautiful you are, Bella,” mur¬ 
mured the mother. “Yes, you shall have jewels, 
bright jewels. I will twine them myself in your 
dark hair, and fasten them on your rounded arms.” 
I have often noticed how much of jewelry is fash¬ 
ioned in serpent form, and have thought it a very 
appropriate design. However that may be, we are 
not sufficiently aware of the number of golden 
serpents that infest this wilderness world. 
“Please ma’am, there is a poor woman here, and 
she wants that you should give her something to 
keep her and her sick daughter from freezing and 
starving.” 
“ How often have I told you, John, not to tell me 
any more such taleB. Inform her that I have noth¬ 
ing for her.” 
“But her sick daughter-” 
“No more! if she won’t work let her go to the 
poor house. Now shut the door, John, and bid her 
be gone.” 
So much for Christian charity. 
Well, well—“shut the door, John” — against the 
shivering, half-clad form — drive her out into the 
dark—the cold—to her fate. Ah, take care! proud, 
heartless woman, lest one day you find the eternal 
doors forever shut against you. Remember Dives 
and Lazarus. 
Out into the drifting snow — out into the cold, 
dark night, wandered the weary feet; now treading 
the broad thoroughfares, now groping through 
dim alleys. 
“You’ve been a longtime,mother,”says a feeble 
voice. 
“ Have I, dear? Well, I won’t leave you again.” 
What a cheerless dwelling,—no light—no fire—not 
anything of comfort. The mother creeps into the 
bed with her child—all wearied and benumbed 
with cold as she is. They both sleep at last — a 
fitful, dreamy slumber. The hours pass on until 
the bell chimes two, and the dismal room is flooded 
with the pale, cold moonlight 
“Mother,” said a faint voice again, “it’s Christ¬ 
mas, isn’t it?” 
“Yes, darling.” 
“ Here, let me kiss you. And oh, mother, I’ve 
had a dream—such a bright, strange dream. I 
thought I was in Bethlehem, and I heard the 
Angels singing over the Babe in the Manger. It 
seems as if I could hear them now, mother. Then 
I thought I was journeying in a road that led from 
Bethlehem to Calvary—from the stable to the cross. 
The path was very narrow and hedged in by thorns, 
and ahead of me were clouds of dust so that I 
could scarcely see; but as I went on the dust was 
laid by blood-drops, and the thorns were sting¬ 
less. Beyond the cross were gates of gold through 
which Angels were passing and re-passing. And 
I dreamed that you and I, mother, stood outside 
until we heard a voice say, 
‘ Lift up your heads, ye golden gates!’ 
and then we passed through singing up to the 
Throne of God.” 
Day-break dawned at last, and a hundred merry 
bells rang in that Christinas morning. The streams 
of sunshine lit up the pale faces of the sleepers, but 
they awoke not. 
Their souls had plumed their everlasting flight 
to the golden gates, and they “passed through 
singing up to the Throne of God.” 
Bella shone in her costly jewels Christmas Day 
but the poor widow and her daughter were num¬ 
bered among the jewels that shine around the 
Throne of God. Winnie Willian. 
Rochester, Dec., 1858. 
As the green blade is the beginning of the har¬ 
vest, so is prayer the prophecy of the blessing that 
is about to come. 
Written for Moore’s Rural New-Yorker. 
MUSIC. 
Gentle Music I On thy bosom 
Thou dost bear away our care, 
Wooing into sweet subjection, 
By thy soft and winning air, 
Passions wild and fitful tempest— 
Angel-mission'd, Music fair— 
When the billows o'er us roll. 
Stormy billows of the soul. 
Fairy Music 1 StraDge and hidden 
Is thy pow’r to make us blest; 
Power to stay the troubl’d beating, 
Power to calm the ruffled breast. 
Sweet-toned Music. Softest accents 
On thy lips forever rest, 
Wafted by the slightest breath, 
Where the spirit folio weth. 
Heav'n-born Music 1 Child of Glory 1 
Leave the blissful regions there, 
To fulfill a holy mission, 
Here where sinful mortals are ; 
Stepping in ’tween us and sorrow 
When we need a gentle care, 
Pointing us to higher things, 
Purer than this earth e’er brings. 
Joyful Music ! only laden 
Are thy gushing notes with bliss ; 
Us to bless and us to gladdeD, 
Precious boon to mortals this. 
When the changing heart is center'd 
In absorbing, thrilling bliss, 
Speed thee, then, abroad o’er earth, 
Scatter gloom and sorrow’s dearth. 
Holy Music! Seraph angels 
Cbant their hymns of love divine ; 
Hosts within the courts of heaven 
Sing their praise at Music’s shrine. 
Glorious art thou. Sounds eiysian 
Issue from that life of thine ; 
Floating through this vale of tears, 
Living in eternal years. 
Piffard, N. Y. 1868. Janb E. H. 
Written for Moore's Rural New-Yorker. 
A “RURAL” REMINISCENCE 
Mr. Moore: —Having been feasted by one of 
your subscribers and admirers to-day with any 
amount of turkey and other goodies, I feel unusu¬ 
ally complacent and benevolent—and from the 
abundance of my good-feeling comes a strong 
desire to make my friends happy also. Not that I 
think I can give you a taste of the good things 
eaten and gone, but the “table talk” turned on 
the New-Yorker, and a lady sitting at my right 
says—“So you take the New-Yorker?— oh, do 
you? Well, I’m glad. I wish we could take it I 
said to Mr. F. the other evening, I wished wo could 
take the New-Yorker next year. I like it very 
much—the best of any paper of the kind—partly, 
perhaps, because I always liked the Editor,” and 
Bhe smiled complacently. 
It was something to know the Editor, I thought, 
so I asked when she knew him, and then came 
such happy, mirth-provoking reminiscences of the 
boy, as he was, when he stopped with us—so plea¬ 
sant and obliging—so full of kind acts to the 
women and children. “ Nothing that he ever said 
do I remember, said she, better than one day as he 
stood warming himself by the fire and condoling 
with a boy-friend in trouble because his was a 
short allowance of the favors so lavished upon 
Daniel. ‘ I’ll tell you,’ said he, ‘ what Mr. Roberts 
told me the other day. He said if I wanted favors 
I mustn’t be slow to do ’em, and if I wanted a big 
piece of pie I must be good to the women. Sup¬ 
pose you try it; I find Enoch (Mr. R) a good 
prophet.’ But Hamilton didn’t believe in prophets, 
be they Enochs or Daniels, and went on his per¬ 
verse way, an obstinate young rebel—resolutely 
setting his face to take the world at the hardest, 
and he has found it hard enough, poor fellow.— 
Daniel always had friends and always will have 
’em. He tries to please, and I like the paper not 
because it’s his alone, but for its nameless good 
points.” 
All joined in liking it too. One old lady said 
the recipes alone were worth twice the subscrip¬ 
tion price of the paper, if it had no other reading. 
Mr. M., a thrifty, open-handed gentleman farmer, 
our genial host, said no farmer should be without 
it—for besides being the best agricultural paper in 
the States, it was second to none as a family jour¬ 
nal. Mr. F. coincides with all these happy remarks, 
but he can’t bear to throw up the Tribune, which 
he has taken more or less for nearly a score of 
years, until it seems a necessity of his life—a some¬ 
thing not to be parted with, and an increase of 
expense is not to be incurred, for the ends only 
just meet now. So it is to be feared that sighing 
for it will have to satisfy, unless my being so good 
as not to tell about the trick in piling that wood- 
pile shall make you remember old friends and 
warm friends with a copy of the paper to help 
knit up the ravelled sleeve of care and send a ray 
of sunshine into our good friend’s home circle.— 
You make glad thousands of happy homes by your 
coming, and incite good resolves in the breasts of 
alL My best wish is that your list may be increased 
by tens the coming year. 
Every one runs wild over the views from your 
patron’s homestead, so I can merely modestly 
decline giving my descriptive powers the benefit 
of a comparison with those of your various cor¬ 
respondents, and will just say that from West 
Point to the head of the Hudson there is not a 
more magnificent stand point than the verandah 
of our host affords. It is almost as useless to try 
to match it as to match your paper or excel our 
almost matchless hostess in getting up good, sen¬ 
sible dinners, where the inner man can be replen¬ 
ished and the whole man rejuvenated and made to 
forget, for a brief space at least, the trials and 
vexations of the outer world. A good dinner 
comes next to a good friend. Here is hoping you 
may be blessed with a plenty of both, and an 
abundance of the good feeling arising from their 
enjoyment. c. l. p. 
Stillwater, Saratoga Co., N. Y., Dec. 10th, ’58. 
Remarks. —We did not intend to give the above 
publicity, lest it should be considered too personal, 
if not evidence of vanity—a touch of autobi¬ 
ography which would render the portrait, that we 
declined giving last week, a natural sequence!— 
The truth is that we handed it to an assistant to 
peruse, and the practical joker had it placed in 
type, and on showing us the article in proof, (just 
as this paper is closing for the press,) he avers 
that it must go in to save time and trouble. We 
are certainly grateful for the kind remembrance 
of early friends, and especially by the writer, 
whom we were wont to draw on a sled so many 
years agone, when she was a Miss of sweet six. 
But our memory is altogether oblivious “ about 
the trick in piling that wood-pile.”—E d. 
THE NEWSPAPER. 
Rev. Henry Ward Beecher thus speaks of the 
newspaper, the common people’s Encyclopedia: 
“ In no other way can so much, so varied, so use¬ 
ful information be imparted, and under circum¬ 
stances so favorable for educating the child’s mind, 
as through a judicious, well conducted newspaper. 
To live in a village, was once to be shut up and 
contracted. But now a man may be a hermit and 
yet a cosmopolite. He may live in the forest, 
walking miles to a post-office, having a mail but 
once a week, and yet he shall be found as familiar 
with the living world as the busiest actor in it— 
For the newspaper is a spyglass by which he brings 
near the most distant things — a microscope by 
which he leisurely examines the most minute ob¬ 
jects—an ear trumpet by which he collects and 
brings within his hearing all that is said and done 
all over the earth — a museum full of living pic¬ 
tures of real life, drawn not on canvas, but with 
printer’s ink on paper. 
The effect of liberalizing and enlarging the mind 
of the young, of this weekly commerce with the 
world, will be apparent to any one who will pon¬ 
der it. Once, a liberal education could only be 
completed by foreign traveL The sons only of the 
wealthy could indulge in this costly benefit But 
now the poor man’s son can learn as much at home, 
as a hundred years ago a gentleman could learn by 
journeying the world over. For while there are 
some advantages in going into the world, it is the 
poor man’s privilege to have the world come to 
see him. The newspaper is a great collector, a 
great traveler, a great lecturer. It is the common 
people’s Encyclopedia—the lyceum, the college.” 
Steadiness of Purpose. —It overcomes difficul¬ 
ties. Not with a rush and a shout, but one by one. 
They melt away before the incessant pressure, as 
icebergs before the steady radiance of the sun. It 
gives one the strength of a happy conscience. A 
weather-cock of a man whiffing about with every 
breeze, cannot have true quietness of mind. Dis¬ 
satisfaction worries and annoys him. But a cheer¬ 
ful vigor and energy grows out of intelligent and 
unvarying purpose. It gives dignity and honor to 
character. Men cannot bnt admire the mind that 
marches steadily on through sunshine and shade, 
calms, smiles and frowns, glad for favor, but press¬ 
ing on without it, thankful for aid, but fixed on 
advancing at all events. Such men cut out for 
themselves a character which cannot but be seen 
and honored. It gives success. In any enterprise 
that is not downright madness such a man must 
succeed. He has the chief element of a triumph 
over every difficulty, and if he is not an idiot he 
will do something in the world. But he will reach 
them. He moves not rapidly, but assuredly. When 
you want to find him, by-and-by, you know where 
to look. You will look at the topmost round of 
the ladder of success, and you will find him about 
there somewhere.— Selected. 
Flowers. — How the universal heart of man 
blesses flowers! They are wreathed around the 
cradle, the marriage-altar, and the tomb! The 
Persian in the far East delights in their perfame, 
and writes his love in nosegays; while the Indian 
child of the far West clasps his hands with glee, as 
he gathers the abundant blossoms — the illumin¬ 
ated Scripture of the prairies. The Cupid of the 
ancient Hindoos tipped his arrows with flowers; 
and orange buds are the bridal crown with us, a 
nation of yesterday. Flowers garlanded the Gre¬ 
cian altar; and they hang in votive weaths before 
the Christian shrine. 
All these are appropriate uBes. Flowers should 
deck the brew of the youthful bride, for they are 
in themselves a lovely type of marriage. They 
should twine round the tomb, for their perpetually 
renewed beauty is a symbol of the resurrection.— 
They should festoon the altar, for their beauty as¬ 
cends in perpetual worship before the Most High. 
—Lydia M. Child. 
Always Firm. — There are some whom the 
lightning of fortune blasts only to render holy,— 
Amidst all that humbles and scathes, amidst all 
that shatters from their life its verdure, smites to 
the earth the pomp and summit of their pride, and 
in the very heart of existence writeth a sudden 
and “ strange defeature,” they stand erect—riven, 
not uprooted, a monument less of pity than of awe! 
There are some who pass through the lazar-house 
of misery, “ with a step more august than a Caesar 
in his halls.” The very things which seen alone 
are despicable and vile, associated with them, be¬ 
come almost venerable and divine; and one ray, 
however dim and feeble, of that intense holiness, 
which in the Infant Savior, shed majesty over the 
manger and the straw, not denied to those who, in 
the depth of affliction, cherish His patient image, 
flings over the meanest localities of earth an ema¬ 
nation from the glory of Heaven.— Selected. 
Old Age. —It is not well that a man should al¬ 
ways labor. His temporal as well as spiritual in¬ 
terest demand a cessation in the decline of life.— 
Some years of quiet and reflection are necessary 
after a life of industry and activity. There is 
more to concern him than incessant occupation, 
and its product—wealth. He who has been a 
drudge all his days, to one monotonous mechanical 
pursuit, can hardly be fit for another world. The 
release from toil in old age most men have the 
prospective pleasure of; and, in the reality, it is as 
pleasing as it is useful and salutary to the mind. 
Such advantages, however, can only be gained by 
prudence and economy in youth; we must save, 
like the ant, before we can hope to have any rest 
in the winter of our days. 
That plenty should produce either covetousness 
or prodigality, is a perversion of providence; and 
yet the generality of men are the worse for their 
riches. 
RUSSIAN STORMS. 
A traveler in Russia says that the storms of 
that country are divided into three classes, the 
first and mildest kind is called the Miatel, the 
second, more severe, Samjots, and the third, which 
is absolutely terrific, the Winga. In a conversa¬ 
tion between himself and a priest, the latter is 
thus described: 
“ What ther, cried I, is the Winga?” 
“ A prelude to the last day,” answered the priest 
Fortunately, unmistakable indications announce 
its coming for some days beforehand. Then no¬ 
body sets out upon a journey, not even to the next 
village, though it be but a verst or two off. Pre- 
caution s ar e taken for the Bafety of the house, by 
protecting it, on t’ne~north side withheavystonesj 
and by propping it up, as well as barns and stables, 
on the south side. The tabunen (troops of wild 
horseB) scamper in all haste to the nearest forest; 
droves of cattle and flocks of sheep seek shelter 
wherever it is to be found. Whatever the storm 
overtakes upon the open plain, man or beast, 
caravans drawn by oxen, or caravans drawn by 
horses, is lost without a chance of rescue. 
“An icy shower of snow is the forerunner of a 
terrible blast; it falls so thick, and drives so hori¬ 
zontally through the air, that to withstand it is 
impossible, whilst it avails little to suffer one’s self 
to be driven before it. For if one escapes for a 
while this prelude to the hurricane, he is infallibly 
overtaken by the formidable blasts and circling 
whirlwinds which succeed it, and which gather 
up from the earth, like chaff from the threshing 
floor, the objects exposed to their violence, and 
hurl them to and fro in the air. And yet the rage 
of the unfettered element is not here at its height; 
for when the storm seems to have exhausted its 
fary in the manner I have described—often raging 
thus during a period of several days—then first 
begins the real tempest, a blast which nothing can 
resist. It uproots whole forests, tosses the lofty 
fir trees into the air like blades of straw, and often 
conveys them high above the earth, whole versts 
away. It levels stables and barns, unroofs houses, 
and throws down church towers, so that the district 
it has visited looks, after its destructive passage 
and for distanoes of several day’s journey, like a 
land ravaged by fire and sword. On all sides are 
seen herds of dead cattle, trees uprooted, villages 
overthrown. In exposed situations, this wind has 
been known to tear up isolated stables, to trans¬ 
port through the air their fragments and the cattle 
they contained, and far, far from the spot, to hurl 
these down shattered upon fields and roofs. With 
varying fury the monster rages a few days, leaving 
behind him, on his departure, death, destruction 
and lamentations. Happily he comes but seldom; 
his visits are not for every generation; but when 
he does come, all that his icy breath touches is 
destined to annihilation. 
This is the Russian Winga!” 
GOLD LEAF MANUFACTURE. 
It is found that a minute per centage of silver 
and copper is necessary to give the gold for gold 
leaf a proper malleable quality—a per centage of 
perhaps one in seventy or eighty. The refiner 
manages this alloy, and brings the costly product 
to a certain stage of completion; he melts the 
gold and the cheaper alloys in a black lead cruci¬ 
ble, removes the solidified and cooled ingot from 
the mould and passes it repeatedly between two 
steel rollers until it assumes the thickness of a 
ribbon; and this ribbon, about one eight-hundredth 
of an inch in thickness, and presenting a surface 
of about 600 square inches to an ounce, passes 
next into the hands of the gold beater. The latter 
takes a hundred and fifty bits of ribbon gold an 
inch square, and interleaves them with as many 
vellum leaves four inches square; they are beaten 
a long time with a ponderous hammer on a smooth 
marble slab, until the gold has thinned and ex¬ 
panded to the size of the vellum. The gold is 
then liberated from the vellum, and each piece cut 
into four; the hundred and fifty thus becoming 
six hundred, and these are interleaved with six 
hundred pieces of gold-beater’s skin, which are 
then packed into a compact mass. Another beat¬ 
ing then takes place—more careful, more delicate, 
more precise than the former —until the gold, 
expanded like the silk worm, so far as its envelope 
will admit, requires to be again released. The 
leaves are again divided into four, by which the 
six hundred become twenty-four hundred; these 
are divided into three parcels of eight hundred 
each, and each parcel is subjected to a third 
beating. 
A BRAIN AND NERVE PEOPLE. 
One who appears to comprehend the American 
people, physically speaking, says with no little 
justice: 
“The Americans are fast becoming nothing else 
but brain and nerves. Fat and fibrine are only 
valued as they sell in the markets, and muscle is 
only thought of as it pertains to our draft ani¬ 
mals. Our stimulating climate and our fast habits, 
make us so nervouB that life is becoming to us 
but one continuous spasm. Our movements are 
like those of a dancing jack. Even our pas¬ 
times are so intense that they fatigue us as much 
as our business. The so-called rest which we 
begrudgingly give ourselves wears us as much as 
our work. We cannot bear to have another called 
more “smart” than ourselves, and we will die and 
be buried rather than not become as rich as our 
neighbors. There is ever the same unsatisfied 
restlessness, whether we go abroad or stay at home, 
Nobody shall travel faster, or see a given number 
of objects in a less number of hours than our¬ 
selves, no matter at what cost of money or health. 
There is no impossible Alps that we will not 
climb, and no deep cave of earth or sea that we 
will not explore. There are none who shall not 
grow numb before ourselves on the highest frozen 
peak, and there shall be none who can hold their 
breath longer under water. When the guide is 
not looking, there is no kiDg’s thronp, or Pope’s 
chair, on which we will not sit There is nothing 
within the scope of human ability which we will 
not undertake, and when we boast of what we 
have accomplished, there are none who shall draw 
a longer bow.” 
Prayer is the incense of the soul. 
The odor of the flower. 
And rises as the waters roll 
To God’s controlling power! 
Within the soul there would not be 
This infinite desire 
To whisper thoughts in prayer to Thee, 
Hadst Thou not lit the fire. 
Prayer is the spirit speaking truth 
To Thee, whose love divine 
Steals gently down like dew to soothe. 
Or like the sunbeams shine ; 
For in the humblest soul that lives, 
As in the lowliest flower, 
The dew drop back His image gives. 
The soul reflects His power. 
At night, when all is hashed and still, 
And e’en soft echo sleeps, 
A still small voice doth o’er me thrill, 
And to each heart-throb leaps ; 
It is the spirit-pulse which beats, 
Forever deep and true ; 
The atom with its Author meets, 
As sunlight greets the dew 1 
Written for Moore’s Rural New-Yorker. 
“CHRIST PLEA8ED NOT HIMSELF.” 
What a rebuke to the selfishness that seeks 
supremely its own gratification, is contained in 
this great truth— “Christ pleased not himself.” 
The Savior and Redeemer of a ruined world—equal 
with the Father—sought not to please himself, bnt 
to honor God in the salvation of men. Yet we, 
unworthy creatures of a day, murmur and repine 
at the trials of our pilgrim way, and grieve that 
our allotments are so different from our desires. 
Oh! how different life might become to us, did 
we seek less to please ourselves, and make it our 
great business to walk so as to please God. Were 
this the guiding principle of our lives,—did we 
bring all our conduct to this test, will it please the 
Savior7 how much richer would be onr Christian 
experience — how much of the darkness that 
hovers over us might be dispelled—how much 
more Bhould we honor Christ, and how much 
more like him should we daily and hourly become. 
Sherburne, N. Y., 1858. Lika Lrr. 
GEMS OF THOUGHT. 
Give me, 0, God, such a true sorrow for my sins 
as shall enable me to embrace all the necessary 
means, how bitter soever, for rooting sin out of 
my soul. 
0 Lord, take my heart, for I cannot give it; and 
when thou hast it, 0 keep it, for I cannot keep it 
for thee; and save me in spite of myself, for Jesus 
Christ’s sake.— Fenelon. 
Many Christians are like chestnuts—very pleas¬ 
ant nuts, bnt enclosed in very prickly burs, which 
need various dealings of Nature, and her grip of 
frost, before the kernel is disclosed. 
A religious life is not a thing which spends 
itself. It is like a river which widens continually, 
and is never so broad or so deep as at its month, 
where it rolls into the ocean of eternity/ 
If I may be permitted to drop one tear as I en¬ 
ter the portals of the city of God, it will be at ta¬ 
king an eternal farewell of that beloved and profit¬ 
able companion, Repentance.— Rowland HilL 
Nothing less than the power and grace of God 
can make men and women what they ought to be; 
you may talk of forms and ceremonies, yet all 
these must fail to change the heart, will, affections, 
and disposition of the human souL “ Ye must be 
born again.” 
By grace, I mean that artless balance of action 
and repose, springing from character, founded on 
propriety, which neither falls short of the demands 
nor overleaps the modesty of nature. Applied to 
execution, it means that dexterous power whioh 
hides the means by which its effect was obtained, 
the difficulties it has conquered.— Fuseli. 
A church may have a creed that may be like 
Jacob’s ladder, uniting earth and heaven, and 
angels of exposition may run nimbly up and 
down upon it before the congregation, and yet, if 
there is no love in that church, unlike the patri¬ 
arch, it will never wake from its sleep, or lift its 
head from the pile of stones on which it lies. 
FAITH. 
God has marked implicitness and simplicity of 
faith with peculiar approbation. He has done 
this through the Scriptures, and he is doing it 
daily in the Christian life. An unsuspecting, un¬ 
questioning, unhesitating spirit, he delights to 
honor. He does not delight in a credulous, weak, 
and unstable mind. He gives ns fall evidence 
when He calls and leads; but He expects to find 
in us what He himself bestows—an open ear and 
a disposed heart Though He gives us not the 
evidence of sense, yet He gives such evidence as 
will be heard by an open ear, and followed by a 
disposed heart “ Thomas, because thou hast seen 
me, thou hast believed; blessed are they that have 
not seen, and yet have believed!” We are wit¬ 
nesses what an open ear and disposed heart will 
do in men of the world. If wealth is their pur¬ 
suit; if a place presents itself before them; if 
their persons, and families, and affairs are the ob¬ 
ject; a whisper, a hint, a probability, a mere 
chance is a sufficient ground of action. It is this 
very state of mind with regard to religion which 
God delights in and honors. He seems to put 
forth His hand, and to say, “Pat thy hand into 
mine, follow all my leadings; keep thyself atten¬ 
tively to every turn.”— Cecil 
Hardships. —The spirit lusts where the flesh 
resteth: for, as the flesh is nourished with sweet 
things, the spirit is refreshed with Bour. — Au¬ 
gustine. 
Christianity. — The spirit of Christianity is 
Christianity. If this he wanting, the glory is 
departed, and nothing remains worth contending 
for.— Cecil 
Reason. —Gospel reason is Gospel command. 
