Enforcing laws, concocted to their need, And when I hear, as oft the listener may, From the Atlas. DEATH OF WILLIAM MILLER, THE PROPHET. MR. MILLER, of Low Hampton, N. Y., somewhat celebrated for his views respecting the nearness of the advent, died at his residence on Thursday, the 20th inst., in his 68th year. He was born at Pittsfield, in this state, February 15, 1782. When he was four years of age, his father' removed to Low Hampton, Washington county, N. Y. At the age of 22, he settled in Poultney, Vt., and was a deputy sheriff for that county. On the commencement of the late war with G. Britain, he received a captain's commission in the U. S. army, where he remained till the peace. He took part in the action at Plattsburg, where 1500 regulars, and about 4000 volunteers, defeated the British, who were 15,000 strong. After the close of the war, he removed to the place of his late residence, where for several years he held the office of a justice of the peace. Mr. Miller was regarded with much affection by his neighbors, who esteemed him as a benevolent, intelligent man, and a kind neighbor. For many years he was a most assiduous student of history and the Scriptures, in the study of which he became impressed with a conviction that the fifth monarchy predicted by Daniel to be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, under the whole heaven, for an everlasting possession, (see Dan. 7th chap.,) was about to be consummated. It becoming known that he entertained these views, he was importuned by many to write out his opinions, and afterwards to defend them in public. After refusing so to do for many years, he at length complied, and has been principally known to the public as a lecturer on prophecy. He thus describes his reluctance to appear in public, and the occasion of his first attempt: will go and tell them what I find in the Bible about the Lord's coming. Instantly all my burden was gone, and I rejoiced that I should not probably be thus called upon, for I had never had such an invitation. My trials were not known, and I had but little expectation of being invited to any field of labor. "In about half an hour from this time, before I had left the room, a son of Mr. Guilford, of Dresden, about sixteen miles from my residence, came in and said that his father had sent for me, and wished me to go home with him. Supposing that he wished to see me on some business, I asked him what he wanted? He replied that there was to be no preaching in their church the next day, and his father wished to have me come and talk to the people on the subject of the Lord's coming. I was immediately angry with myself for having made the covenant I had; I rebelled at once against the Lord, and determined not to go. I left the boy without giving him any answer, and retired in great distress to a grove near by. There I struggled with the Lord for about an hour, endeavoring to release myself from the covenant I had made with him, but I could get no relief. It was impressed upon my conscience, Will you make a covenant with God, and break it so soon?' and the exceeding sinfulness of thus doing overwhelmed me. I finally submitted; and promised the Lord that if he would sustain me, I would go, trusting in him to give me grace and ability to perform all he should require of me. I returned to the house, and found the boy still waiting; he remained till after dinner, and I returned with him to Dresden.' From this time and onward he was pressed with invitations to present his views in many places, Eastern, and Middle States, and Canada, and and travelled extensively throughout the Northern, labored almost constantly for the succeeding twelve years; but visited no place without first receiving an urgent invitation. with an 66 He was disappointed in the fulfilment of his expectations in 1843, and came out the next year the want of accuracy in his chronological calculaApology and Defence," acknowledging tions, but claiming that the nature and nearness of the event was still sustained by scriptural evidence. In that belief he has since lived and died-worn out with the infirmities of age. He was a man strictly temperate in all his habits, devoted in his family and social attachments, and proverbial for his integrity. His brain was of efforts. He was naturally very amiable in his large volume, and he was capable of great mental temperament; but when he thought he was unjustly represented, he often indulged in biting sarcasm on his revilers. His mental faculties were clear to the last, and he fell asleep joyful in the hope of a speedy resurrection. [We heard" Father Miller" preach on this great subject, to an immense audience, one night in Phil 'elphia. His evident sincerity, earnestness, and splicity, attracted to him our high respect. We the the success which marked his labors, notwithstanding Lis want of learning even upon his chosen subject, az fom his bringing prominently forward a neglected truth. And it is to be feared that his confident and ill-founded predictions as to the time, will throw temporary discredit upon the great burden of many prophecies-the second coming "One Saturday, after breakfast, in the summer of 1833, I sat down at my desk to examine some point, and as I arose to go out to work, it came home to me with more force than ever, Go and tell it to the world.' The impression was so sudden, and came with such force, that I settled down into my chair, saying, I can't 6 Lord. go, Why not?' seemed to be the response; and then all my excuses came up, my want of ability, &c. ; but my distress became so great, I entered into a solemn covenant with God, that if he would open the way, I would go and perform my duty to the world. of our Lord.-Liv. Age.] 'What do you mean by opening the way?' seemed to come to me. Why, said I, if I should * In all his published works he always stated the time have an invitation to speak publicly in any place, I as "about 1843.” From the Christian Observer. ON A SENSE OF THE DIVINE PRESENCE. ence. WHEN God would impress upon the mind of Abrahan the duty and necessity of adhering to Him with full integrity of heart, he seems to make this dependent on a continued sense of His presAll religion he comprises, as it were, in these two particulars-the one the means, the other the end of our salvation; "Walk before meand be thou perfect.” (Gen. xvii. 1.) In numberless passages of Scripture," to walk" is used as a term synonymous with "to live." Thus, "Enoch walked with God;" that is, he lived continually in His presence. (Gen. v. 22.) "Noah was a just man, and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God." (Gen. vi. 9.) Thus the Evangelist describes Zechariah and Elizabeth as "both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless." (Luke i. 6.) In the same sense does our blessed Lord employ the term: "He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." (John viii. 12.) Thus also the Apostle We walk by faith, not by sight," (2 Cor. v. 7;) "Walk in the Spirit," (Gal. v. 16;)" Walk in love," (Eph. v. 2;) “ Walk in wisdom,” (Col. iv. 5.) It is needless to multiply passages in which life is thus termed a walk. The question is, why it should be so termed ? And for this many reasons may be assigned : 66 66 learn our lessons for eternity. Here we are to be fitted for the part we are to act, and the rank we are to hold, in the great society above. In this childhood of our existence it is that we must make preparation for our maturer state. Such are the motives which should urge us to diligence and alacrity in our Christian course. Such are the considerations which show how it is that life, if it be life indeed, is appropriately styled "a walk." 3. And to aid and animate us in turning this similitude to moral and spiritual account, let us consider that in a natural sense, whether we will or no, life is a ceaseless motion, and a continual approximation to the grave. We are like men who travel in some vehicle to a given country. On the wheels of time we are going forward; the chariot which bears us is constantly advancing. Whether we sleep or wake, whether we think of it or not, whether the motion be rough or smooth, still we are making way, and the distance between us and eternity is lessening. While I write these lines the sand is falling from the hour-glass of life, and he who reads them exhausts upon every page and every line some portion of his brief existence here. Thus we never continue in one stay.' Thus is life a journey, and on that account, as well as others, is fitly termed a walk. 66 Seeing, then, that the goal to which we tend is not the extinction of our being, but our entrance into a new and an eternal state, with what solemn seriousness should we attend to that gracious counsel, "Walk before me, and be thou perfect." But, it will be said, are not all things, animate and inanimate, "before"-that is in the presence of-" God." Does not His ubiquity fill heaven and earth? "Whither shall I go from thy Spirit?" says the Psalmist; "or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morn 1. It may be intended to picture to our minds the high rank we hold in God's creation. While the inferior animals are, as has been finely observed, prone to the earth from which they sprung, and on which their all depends, the countenance of man is uplifted to his native heavens. Thus erect in walking does man seem by his attitude to claim his right of sovereignty over this lower world; and, by his measured step and deliberate motion, appear as if calm thought and self-possession set his feet upon a rock and established his goings.ing, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, Such was man once, and to such a state he may be abundantly restored by the power of a new creation. ין even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me." If, then, God is equally present to everything that He has made; if His 2. Walking also implies a going forward. enemies, as well as His friends, live and move And, as used in Scripture, this term reminds us and have their being within the circle of His that the Christian life is not stationary, but a con- essence; if every blasphemy which is uttered, as tinued growth in grace; so that at the end of each well as every prayer that is offered up, enters into year, each month, each week, we should be able His ears; if every deed of foul impurity, as well to report progress, to thank God and take courage. as every act of faithful obedience, is performed in As we awake each morning, we should say to the full blaze of His all-pervading light, in what ourselves, "Let this be an improve culiar sense can that injunction be understood, the past; let me watch more w Welk before me;" or in what manner is it to be than I have done before; let me L 1? To live in the presence of God is only in prayer than I have ever beel oby a law of universal nature, from which there more sensible of the presence of C possibility of exemption. What obligation, ever been before; let me endeavor then, I repeat it, did God lay upon the Patriarch morning's calm throughout the business of the day when he addressed him in those emphatic words? with less interruption, and with happier success, It was no other than that in which the whole of than in times now gone forever." We should religion essentially consists; namely, a conformity continually remember that this world is a school of our will, our inclination, and our deportment to of education for the soul, and that here we must the unchangeable constitution of things. To do so p those processes of mere nature set forth the lifegiving power of the uncreated sun upon man's immortal essence, and the rapture with which his spirit hails the dawning of an endless day? The truth is, that the felt presence of God is the secret of all happiness; and holiness and happiness are inseparably bound together. They act and reäct upon each other. They are interchangeably cause and effect. If holiness infallibly brings happiness in its train; so is happiness the great moral instrument by which, where the conscience and the will are right, the soul has power to perfect holi ness, sin and misery produce and reproduce each other-sin, the prolific source of all unhappiness, and unhappiness impairing the energies of the soul, so that it lies passive under whatever impression the corporeal senses may make upon it. The fact is, that man is impelled by the primary instincts of his compound being to seek for happiness. And if his higher principle have lost the realizing sense of its appropriate felicity, he will yield to those attractions which draw him down to the mere animal propensities of his nature. It is only in the light of God's felt presence, that we can see those brighter objects which, by contrast, expose the wretchedness of all that this world can offer to satisfy the thirstings of the soul. is in fact to make a virtue of necessity, and to be in voluntary agreement with the Mind at whose disposal all things are. If such be our case, our happiness is secure forever. While lingering here below, and tied to these mortal bodies, we shall indeed groan, being burdened with the pains and penalties of flesh and blood. But with this drawback, the soul which wills what God wills has found the secret of true felicity even here; and, when freed from its companionship with this earthly tabernacle, will enjoy that true felicity to the full. It will, in a certain sense, have a share in the happiness of God himself. For if, "what-ness. As in the opposite hemisphere of dark-. soever pleaseth him, that doeth he in heaven and in earth," it follows that every movement of the all-directing Mind, every order that issues from the seat of universal government, every errand on which angels and archangels are sent forth-that all these must meet the full approval of, and consequently be ceaseless accessions of, new pleasure to the soul which is in sympathy with the will of God. If, then, it be an essential attribute of God, that every creature should be continually in His sight, it follows that he whose will is in accordance with this attribute, must dwell in the atmosphere of his own choice, in the very element of his own heart's desire. The presence of God is to him as the genial air he breathes, as the sun which spreads its light over the whole map of his exist-Man's nature is so constructed, that the machinery ence. Nor is this consciousness that he is encircled by Deity, and has his being in God, more conducive to the believer's happiness than promotive of his virtue. In ancient Rome, the young patricians were exhorted, by an act of the imagination, to place the elder Cato continually before them. It was thought, that, with such a witness of their actions, they would be ashamed to behave themselves inconsistently with the dignity of their position. And thus it is that, in an immeasurably higher degree, the constant remembrance of those words, "Thou, God, seest me," would act upon the mind that realized that amazing truth. If men can, and do, uniformly control the fiercest passions (passions which, by a strange delusion, they still think to be uncontrollable) in the presence of any respected or decent fellow-creature; is it not clear to common sense that, were God to appear in living manifestation, all sin would fly "to the moles and to the bats; would go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, for fear of the Lord and for the glory of his majesty?" Is it not clear that, when "God arose, his enemies would be scattered; and those that hate him would flee before him?" Nor would this habitual sense of encircling Deity promote our sanctification by its awful incongruity with sin alone. It would effect that all important purpose by the invigoration which it would impart to all the higher faculties of our nature. If the material sun pour such streams of gladness into the heart of man, and the outgoing of the morning light up the landscape on which he looks with such enchantment; yet how faintly can thereof is worked, not by appeals of abstract reasoning to his understanding, but by exhibitions presented to his moral vision. He will infallibly be led by what he sees. To some attraction he must yield; for he is not independent, nor can he stand alone. He must attach himself to something; not by corporeal contact, but by moral fusion and spiritual assimilation. He will, in a word, become like and partake of the nature of whatever occupies his field of vision. If he sees God, he will be like God. If that glorious sun goes down, he will sink to the level of those objects which darkness generates and brings forth. Such, then, is the force of those emphatic words, "Walk before me, and be thou perfect; live in the felt sense of my continual presence, and the mighty working of that conviction will subdue all things unto itself. The pure and holy atmosphere which you breathe will invigorate every faculty of your soul with salient health and freshness. Abashed by that light, sin and impurity will fly from its piercing beams to the darkness from which they sprung." Thus it is that like draws to like, and all things seek to mingle with their connatural element. Ye," says the Apostle, "are all the children of light, and the children of the day we are not of the night, nor of darkness. Therefore, let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep, sleep in the night; and they that be drunken, are drunken in the night. But let us, who are of the day, be suber, putting on the breast-plate of faith and love; and for an helmet the hope of salvation." 66 From the Boston Book-published by Ticknor & Co. THE MORNING VISIT. BY O. W. HOLMES. A SICK man's chamber, though it often boast The Morning Visit-not till sickness falls 'Tis a small matter in your neighbor's case, O then, indeed, it pulls another string, Calm as a clock your knowing hand directs, Or traces on some tender missive's back And leaves your patient to his qualms and gripes, But change the time, the person, and the place, In future practice it may serve your turn. It's mighty different when you quackle down Be gentle, then, though Art's unsparing rules 66 Of all the ills that suffering man endures, The largest fraction liberal Nature cures ; Of those remaining, 't is the smallest part Yields to the efforts of judicious Art; But simple kindness kneeling by the bed, To shift the pillow for the sick man's head, Give the fresh draught to cool the lips that burn, Fan the hot brow, the weary frame to turn; Kindness-untutored by our grave M. D.'s, But nature's graduate, whom she schools to please, Wins back more sufferers with her voice and smile, Than all the trumpery in the druggist's pile. Once more, be quiet-coming up the stair, Learn the sweet magic of a cheerful face; Sheds o'er my chamber its benignant ray. Roland Cashel. By Charles Lever. Illustrated. Completed in Three Parts. Fairy Tales from all Nations. Illustrated by Doyle. [A very handsome book, with very many wood engravings.] Noel on Christian Baptism. FROM C. S. FRANCIS & Co. The Story of Storics; or Fun for the Little Ones. With Engravings. The Christmas Tree; The Turtle Dove; Fireside Tales. [Three neat little books by Mary Howitt. Her name will sell any book, and we should like to read all she writes.] C. S. FRANCIS & Co. have just published a beautiful edition of "Moore's Melodies," the appearance of which is equal to the emanations of 142 Moxon's press. economical terms. We have seen no edition of this DEDICATION. Hears round about him voices as it darkens, So walking here in twilight, O my friends! popular work so tastefully executed, on such As one who, walking in the twilight gloom, And pause, and turn to listen, as each sends One touch of fire-and all the rest is mystery! The same publishers have also issued a new Spake from the printed leaves or pictured faces! Perhaps on earth I never shall behold, With eye of sense, your outward form and semblance ; FROM TICKNOR, REED & FIELDS. But live forever young in my remembrance. Old Portraits and Modern Sketches. By John G. Therefore I hope to join your seaside walk, Whittier. Poems, by James Russell Lowell. 2 vols. From the Home Journal. A new book by Longfellow is sure to attract attention. Whatever his merits as compared with other literary men in this country, "Kavanagh" and other works of his have shown that none is before him in the sympathies of the book-buyers. He is indeed a great artist, both in words and in those qualities of imagination, without which mere verbal felicities are of scarcely more account than colors to a blind man. He has also the too rare distinction of being justly apprehended in his lifetime. His exquisite compositions which are to delight the coming ages, find from the beginning their proper and enduring level. The "Seaside and the Fireside," is a collection of pieces written since the publication of the octavo edition of his works, and it embraces several of his first and most characteristic productions. We prefer-as our readers will-to any elaborate commentaries, the illustration of his genius by specimens. We extract first, the Saddened, and mostly silent, with emotion; The grand, majestic symphonies of ocean. The longest poem in the volume is entitled "The Building of the Ship." It is one of his noblest performances, reminding us of Schiller's Song of the Bell, though not containing a syllable that could have been suggested by it. The concluding lines will find now an echo in every patriotic heart. Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State! With all the hopes of future years, |