"Stop traveller; bow the head to the mother of God-the queen of heaven." When men recover from sickness, their cure is ascribed mainly to her, and votive offerings are hung up in her churches, as in the temples of Pagan idols in ancient Rome. Indeed, it seems obvious to the most superficial observer, that she has here supplanted the worship of the Redeemer, and that Satan has completely travestied Christianity in that city to which he still, with great subtlety, points men as the metropolis of Christianity. I found only two churches dedicated to the Saviour, and in one of them the Virgin's name was coupled with his; while she has (as I counted) twentynine dedicated to herself, an altar perhaps in every church in Rome, and images at every corner and cross-way. And, not satisfied with this, they carry her images in procession-miraculous images they are sometimes called; but the finest we have seen was a wax-doll, as large as life, dressed in a pink gown, an embroidered mantle of light blue, and a crown on her head-an object of as essential idolatry as could be found at this moment in any Heathen land. In her arms she usually carries the infant Saviour; the streets through which she is to pass are strewed with flowers; the windows are hung with the finest tapestries; monks and nuns conduct the procession; and the whole city does homage on these occasions to her who is beyond all controversy their household god. She is called "The Consoler of the Afflicted," "The Helper of Christians," "The Refuge of Sinners," ," "The Dispenser of Consolation, of Peace, of Divine Aid, of Divine Love." In a word, under Popery, the Virgin is all that the Lord Jesus is under Christianity. After witnessing these things, one is at no loss to understand the effect which the Roman preachers have upon the hearts of their hearers. They can represent to them the Virgin weeping, or rejoicing over her child, just as any mother of earth would do; and all this finds a quick response in the minds of people so impassioned as the Italians. There is nothing spiritual, nothing immaterial presented to them. Their religion just refers to the common relations of life, a little elevated by being connected with a sacred name; and, by the help of such machinery, Satan enthrals, darkens, and destroys, the souls of men who are posting to the bar of God, with a lie not merely in their right hands, but in their hearts. Nor is it only among common-place preachers that such things are done. Their choicest and most eloquent men use the same language, and plead with their fellow-creatures from the same motives faith in the Virgin is the substance of all they say. "Yes, yes," exclaims Segneri, one of their most eloquent and original preachers; "ply this lovely practice of devotion. Ask of God no favour, great or small, which you do not ask for the merits of Mary. Represent on all occasions to Jesus that bosom so pure on which he clothed himself with human flesh; that milk which nourished him; those tears which bathed him; and doubt not that your prayers will be accepted every hour. Let us seek grace; and by Mary let us seek it. Thus teaches the most wise St Bernard, because Mary cannot be frustrated. Do we wish health?-by Mary let us seek it. Do we Do we Do we But, wish knowledge ?-by Mary let us seek it. wish talents?-by Mary let us seek them. wish consolation?-by Mary let us seek it. above all, do we ask divine grace ?-by Mary let us seek it. Let us seek grace, my dear sinners, let us seek grace, and by Mary let us seek it. She is that most precious of women, who has found a jewel so precious as divine grace; and for whom has she found it, if not for us ?-for us, so wicked, so perfidious! Let us go, then, let us go to her, and freely ask it; she will never be able to deny it." No mother, at least no Roman mother-none but a Christian, could resist this; and it is thus that the religion of Rome mimics all that is called Christian, and degrades all that is holy in religion to the rank of an earthly passion. The grand error involved in all these superstitious practices, indeed the basis of the Popish creed, is a corruption of the fundamental doctrine of Chris tianity-salvation by the righteousness of a Mediator. This was the plan which God, in mercy, divulged for the redemption of lost man. It was effective and complete, because it was divine. But, to corrupt || what he could not crush, Satan established at Rome a monstrous perversion of what the Lord Jesus had established at Jerusalem. Instead of one Mediator || between God and man, we have hundreds of media- |' tors; yea, so many, that on the day of All Saints. when these host of mediators are worshipped, the idolatrous Romans, wearied and hoarse with their supplications to the saints, called over by name, as in a muster-roll, are obliged to take refuge at last in an "et ceteri sancti, orate pro nobis." Time or strength would fail them even to repeat the names of the whole. Withdrawing men's thoughts from. the true Intercessor, to fix them on the imaginary mediators, who yet cannot mediate if they would and would not if they could, Satan has accomplished his object; men's souls are allured to destruction down a path made apparently smooth by being like the religion of revelation, but, in effect, destroying it-extirpating it-annihilating it. But it is vain to argue or remonstrate against Romanism. The Christian indeed rejects it at once, as an incubus on the spirit of man. By the semblance of religion involved in it, it lulls conscience, by a soporific from which it seldom awakes; and if conscience be lulled, the Romanist feels satisfied his duty is done, and all is right. The master-stroke of its policy is thus to keep conscience quiet, not to enlighten it, not to convince it of sin, and lead to Him who taketh sin away; but to prevent it from discover. I ing sin, by prescribing certain forms of religion, in which men are to engage with the spirit and on the principles of men of this world in their business. The task to be performed, or the problem to be solved, is manifestly this-" Given a certain number of crosses to be made, of aves, paternosters, and prayers to be repeated; required the most speedy mode of doing it?" To this work men, women, and children, priests and laymen, the consecrated and the vile, hasten with an industry that would be com mendable in any other work, and yet with a manifes: want of interest in what they do, which would be ridiculous, did we not know and feel the mockery CHRIST'S PRESENCE PRECIOUS. that is offered to God by the supposition that he exacts or can receive prayers by tale. It is not to be denied that we find exactly the same spirit of formality in Protestant countries; but, in the one case, the error originates in the fact that religion, or rather superstition, prescribes the error-in the other the error prevails in spite of religion; and it is for this reason that Romanism should be prayed and watched against by all who know the value of souls on the one hand, and the simple religion of Jesus Christ upon the other. CHRIST'S PRESENCE PRECIOUS. (From "Mount of Olives," by Rev. James Hamilton.) LET me mention some benefits of Christ's perpetual presence with his people, especially when that presence is recollected and realized. 1. It is sanctifying. The company of an earthly friend is often influential on character. If he be one of a very pure and lofty mind, and, withal, one who has gained an ascendency over your own soul, his very presence is a talisman. If an angry storm be gathering in your bosom, or lowering in your countenance, the unexpected sunshine of his heavenly aspect will disperse it all again. If mean or unworthy thoughts were creeping into your mind, the interruption of his noble presence will chase them all away. If you are on the point of declining some difficult enterprise, or evading some incumbent duty, the glance of his remonstrating eye will at once shame away your indolence or cowardice, and make you up and doing. So the Saviour's recollected presence is a constant reproof and a ceaseless incentive to an affectionate disciple. Is he provoked? Is his temper ruffled? Is he about to come out with some sharp or cutting sarcasm, or to deal the indignant blow? One look from the Lamb of God will calm his spirit -will cool the flush of fury in his burning cheekwill make his swelling heart beat softly. Are you tempted? Do evil thoughts arise in your heart? One glance from these holy eyes can chase away a whole legion of devils, and banish back into the pit each foul suggestion. Are you seized with a lazy or selfish fit? Are you wearying of work which for some time you were doing, or refusing work which God is now giving you to do? Are you angry at an affliction, or averse to a given task? Lo! he puts to his hand, and offers to help you with this cross, and you observe that it is a pierced hand; and he offers to go before and show you the way, and you notice that the footprints are bleeding, and it wounds you to think that you should have needed such an admonition. Or you have just come away from a scene of guilt-from a company where you have denied him-where you have just been saying, by your conduct, by your silence, or your words, "I know not the man;" and as you encounter the eye of Jesus, whom they are leading away to crucify, O Peter, do you not go forth, and weep bitterly? 2. Christ's presence is sustaining. The apostles were wonderfully calm and collected men. People, considering that they were, many of them, unlearned and ignorant, were amazed at their dignified composure in most difficult circumstances. It was scarcely possible to alarm or agitate them. When brought before kings and rulers, it was usually their judges who trembled, but they themselves were tranquil. And Paul tells us the secret of it. When he himself was brought before Cæsar, it was an agitating occasion. Nero was a cruel prince, and the people looked on his palace much as they would have 593 looked on a leopard's den. An order has arrived to bring the Galilean prisoner to the emperor's judg ment-hall. The apostle had just time to warn a few friends, and like enough they came and condoled with him; but they thought it prudent not to go with him into court. It might compromise their own safety, and it could do him no effectual good;and he did not urge them. The soldiers arrived, and he went away cheerily with them-the old weatherbeaten man-without his cloak, for he had left it at Troas; without his friends, for he had left them behind at his own hired house as forlorn as ever prisoner stood before Cæsar. And how was it that the infirm old man passed, with so serene a look, the clashing swords and scowling sentries at the palacefront? How was it that he trod the gloomy gateway with a step so full of merry innocence and martyrzeal, and never noticed Nero's lions snuffling and howling in their hungry den? And how was it that in the dim and dangerous presence-chamber, where cruelty sat upon the throne of luxury-how was it that, with that wolf upon the judgment-seat, and those blood-hounds all around him-with none but Pagans present, and not one believing friend to bear thee company-how was it, O Paul! that in such an hour of peril, instead of pleading Not guilty, and falling down on suppliant knees, thou didst commit the very crime they charge against thee-the crime of loyalty to Jesus-and urge Christ's claims on Cæsar? Why the secret of this strange courage was, "At my first answer no man stood with me, but all forsook me. Notwithstanding, THE LORD stood with me and strengthened me, that by me the preaching might be fully known, and that all the Gentiles might hear; and I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion." And you, my friends, will all be brought into agitating circumstances. It is not likely that it will be said to you, "Fear not, for thou must stand before Cæsar." But you may be arraigned before terrible tribunals-the tribunal of public opinion-the tribu nal of private affection- the tribunal of worldly interest-for Christ's name's sake. From time to time you may be constrained to pass through ordeals which will make you understand how Paul felt when passing in at the palace-gate. When called to give your testimony for Christ, the flesh may be weak, and the willing word may be like to expire in your choking utterance. Worldly wisdom may beckon you back, and, like Paul's fearful friends, cautious or carnal Christians may refuse to support you. It is not Nero's hall, but a quiet parlour you are entering; but before you come out again you may be a poor man, or a friendless one. The Yes or No of one faithful moment may have spurned the ladder of promotion from under your feet, and dashed your brightest hopes on this side the grave. Or, by the time the letter you are now penning is closed, and sealed, and posted, and the sinful assent, or the compromising proposal, or the resolute refusal is written, the Lord Jesus will have said, "I know thy works, that thou hast a name, that thou livest and art dead;" or, "I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot;" or, "I know thy works; behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it; for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name. I also will keep thee." In such fiery trials of love and fidelity, there is nothing so sure to overcome as the recollected presence of "Lo! I am with you." And, oh! it is sweeter, like the three holy children, to pace up and down beneath the furnace's flaming vault, arm in arm with the Son of Man, than to tread the green pastures of an earthly promotion or a carnal tranquillity purchased by the denial of Jesus, and so with the wrath of the Lamb. 3. Comforting. You have noticed the difference in travelling the same road solitary and in pleasant company. "What! we are not here already! It takes three hours to do it, and we have not been half that time. Well! I could not have believed it; but then I never before travelled it with you." No doubt Cleopas and his comrade used to think the road from Jerusalem to Emmaus long enough, and were very glad when they reached the fiftieth furlong. But that evening when the stranger from Jerusalem joined them, they grudged every waymark which they passed; and as, in the progress of his expositions, Moses and all the prophets beamed with light from heaven, and their own hearts glowed warmer and warmer, they would fain have counted the mile-stones back again. "How vexing! This is Emmaus; but you must not go on. 'Abide with us, for the day is far spent."" Any road which you travel solitary is long enough, and any stage of life's journey where no one is with you, will be dreary and desolate. But you need have no such companionless stages-no such cheerless journeys. If you be a disciple, the Lord Jesus always is with you. And whether they be the silent weeks which you spend in search of health in some far-away and stranger-looking place, or the long voyage in the sea-roaming ship, or the shorter journey in the rattling stage or railway car-if, in reading, or musing, or lifting up your heart, you can realize that Saviour's presence, who is about your path and compasses all your ways, you will be almost sorry when such a journey is ended, and when such a solitude is exchanged for more wonted society. I can almost believe that John Bunyan left Bedford Jail with a sort of trembling, fearing that he might never find again such a Bethel as he had found in that narrow cell for the last twelve years; and I can understand how Samuel Rutherford wrote from his place of banishment: "Christ hath met me in Aberdeen, and my adversaries have sent me here to be feasted with his love. I would not have believed that there was so much in Jesus as there is. But Come and see,' maketh Christ be known in his excellency and glory." PASSING AWAY. "His days are as a shadow that passeth away."-PSALMS. Passing away! "Tis told by the dew-drops that sparkle at morn, "Tis written on flowers that bloom at our side, 'Tis sung by the birds, in each musical note,' 66 Passing away! spray," "Tis sighed by the leaves when the chill autumn breeze Tears rudely their hold from the wind-shaken trees; They whisper alike to the thoughtful and gay, 'Man's life, like the autumn leaf, passeth away." WHERE DID HE GET THAT LAW? IN a neat and beautiful city, in one of the Northern States, lived a lawyer of eminence and talents. I do not know many particulars of his moral character, but he was notoriously profane. He had a Negro boy, at whom his neighbours used to hear him swear with awful violence. One day this gentleman met an elder of the Presbyterian Church, who was also a lawyer, and said to him: "I wish, Sir, to examine into the truth of the Christian religion. What books would you advise me to read on the evidences of Christianity?" is a question, Sir, which you ought to have settled i The elder, surprised at the inquiry, replied: "That long ago. You ought not to have put off a subject so important to this late period of life." "It is too late," said the inquirer; "I never knew much about it, but I always supposed that Christianity was rejected by the great majority of learned men. I intend, however, now to examine the subject i thoroughly myself. I have upon me, as my physi cian says, a mortal disease, under which I may live a year and a-half or two years, but not probably longer. What books, Sir, would you advise me to read?" "The Bible," said the elder. "I believe you do not understand me," resumed the unbeliever, surprised in his turn; "I wish to investigate the truth of the Bible." "I would advise you, Sir," repeated the elder, "to read the Bible; and (he continued) I will give you my reasons: Most Infidels are very ignorant of the Scriptures. Now to reason on any subject with correctness, we must understand what it is about which we reason. In the next place, I consider the internal evidence of the truth of the Scriptures stronger than the external." "And where shall I begin?" inquired the unbe liever" at the New Testament?" "No," said the elder; "at the beginning-at Genesis." The Infidel bought a commentary, went home, and P sat down to the serious study of the Scriptures. He applied all his strong and well-disciplined powers of mind to the Bible, to try rigidly but impartially its truth. BEROE. believer at his house or office, walking the room with a dejected look, his mind apparently absorbed in thought. He continued, not noticing that any one had come in, busily to trace and retrace his steps. The elder at length spoke : 595 intellect. We were not surprised, however, to find that, after all, it was doubtful whether the lawyer referred to, now dead, had ever truly embraced Jesus Christ as offered in the Gospel. There is more of intellect than of heart in his experience, as above "You seem, Sir," said he, "to be in a study. Of narrated-more of setting God's Word at the bar of what are you thinking? "The first commandment," continued he, "directs us to make the CREATOR the object of our supreme love and reverence. That is right. If he be our Creator, and Preserver, and Supreme Benefactor, we ought to treat him, and none other,' as such. The second forbids idolatry. That is certainly right. The third forbids profaneness. The fourth fixes a time for religious worship. If there be a God, he ought surely to be worshipped. It is suitable that there should be an outward homage, significant of our inward regard. If God be worshipped, it is proper that some time' should be set apart for that purpose, when all may worship him harmoniously, and without interruption. One day in seven is certainly not too much, and I do not know that it is too little. The fifth defines the peculiar duties arising from family relations. Injuries to our neighbour are then classified by the moral law. They are divided into offences against life, chastity, property, and character. And," said he, applying a legal idea with legal acuteness, "I notice that the greatest offence in each class is expressly forbidden. Thus the greatest injury to life is murder; to chastity, adultery; to property, theft; to character, perjury. Now the greater offence must include the less of the same kind. Murder must include every injury to life; theft every injury to honesty, and so of the rest. And the moral code is closed and perfected, by a command forbidding every improper desire in regard to our neighbour. "I have been thinking," he proceeded, "where did Moses get that law? I have read history: the Egyptians and the adjacent nations were idolaters; so were the Greeks and Romans; and the wisest and best Greeks or Romans never gave a code of morals like this. Where did Moses get this law which surpasses the wisdom and philosophy of the most enlightened ages? He lived at a period comparatively barbarous, but he has given a law, in which the learning and sagacity of all subsequent time can detect no flaw. Where did he get it? He could not have soared so far above his age as to have devised it himself. I am satisfied where he obtained it. It came down from heaven. I am convinced of the truth of the religion of the Bible!" The Infidel-Infidel no longer-remained to his death a firm believer in the truth of Christianity. [This story is not without its value, as showing the power of the evidence for the divine origin of Christianity, even when brought to bear merely on the man's reason, than of man, a sinner, finding himself at the bar of God's justice. No doubt intellectual may, by the guidance of God's Spirit, lead to heart conviction; but the work which begins at the heart, and through it reaches and humbles the intellect, is more likely to prove genuine and lasting.] BERÖE. BY THE REV. D. LANDSBOROUGH, STEVENSTON. IN giving an account of what fell under our notice in the way from Brodick to Corrie, I intentionally omitted one discovery, that I might return to it, and speak of it more fully. One of the greatest treats we had in this lovely summer morning's walk was our falling in with a whole fleet of Beröes. And what is a Beröe? It is a living creature; and in Professor Fleming's "British Animals" it is ranked among Radiata acalepha. As astronomers give classical names to planets, and stars, and constellations, from their imaginary resemblance, in some respect, to some person, or animal, or inanimate objects-such as Saturn, Jupiter, Venus, the Ram, the Bull, the Lyre; so naturalists, in imitation of astronomers often give classical names to the animals they de scribe. Now, Beröe is mentioned as one of the seanymphs by Virgil in the striking fable of Aristau and his bees; and were it justifiable, thus as it were to honour Heathen mythology, we would say that the name is well chosen; for our Beröe correspond. to the description given by Virgil of his sea-maid :-Clioque et Beroe soror: Oceanitides ambæ, Ambæ auro, pictis incinctæ pellibus ambe." "Clio and Beröe, from one father both, Both girt with gold, and clad in parti-coloured cloth." This description was still more applicable to anothe species afterwards found, though this one was a times entitled to it, from the golden iridescence o its hues. The Beröe now found was not unknown to me, but it was new to my young companions, who beheld it with much interest. It requires a practise eye readily to detect this fragile diaphanous creature. It is not very rare in the Firth of Clyde; but it mus be rare in some of our seas; for a first-rate naturalist. who is acquainted with almost all the creeping creatures, and all the natant beauties of the deep, mentioned to me that it has never been his good fortune to find a Beröe; and Dr Fleming, at the time his "British Animals" was published, seems to have seen but one specimen, though I know that he is now acquainted with five or six species. The first I ever saw was caught in a gauze net by Professor Edward Forbes, when he and I were with Mr Smith of Jordanhill in his yacht, the " Amethyst," in the Kyles of Bute. Having thus learned to be on the outlook for them, I found them afterwards in tranquil creeks at Milport and at Ardrossan. I was going to say that it is one of the most beautiful and interesting of the little inhabitants of the deep; but so many of the dwellers in the deep are beautiful and interesting, that the one under consideration at the time is apt to be regarded as the most attractive. This, however, is not a bulky beauty-not of the Dutch make; for it is only about an inch and a quarter in length, and three-quarters of an inch in diameter; and it is almost as transparent as the limpid element in which it floats. It is, I believe, the Beröe ovata of Professor Fleming; and I shall extract part of the description given of it in his "British Animals:" "Beröe ovata. The body orbicular, slightly depressed at the summit, and a little protuberant at the base. There were eight vertical bands or ribs extending from the summit to the base. These were narrow, lated on the margin, confined to the surface, and of denticua denser substance than the gelatinous interior. From the central substance of the ribs a number of filaments proceeded, which were lost in the substance of the body. The mouth, or opening at the base, had some appearance of having its margin divided into four lobes. . . . . Each rib is furnished with a tube, uniting with it near the middle. I could easily observe the water enter the tube at the summit, pass into the lateral vesicles, and go out at their external openings; and in some cases the motion of the current was reversed," &c. .... Our Beröe also was egg-shaped, and divided into equal compartments by eight longitudinal ribs. It consisted of pellucid gelatine, so that it was like a floating egg of fine crystal. But the most wonderful part of the animal is the tubular ribs through which streams of water flow. They are close set externally, with fine cilia, upwards of a hundred on each rib; so that when it wishes to move, these cilia, like a thousand paddles, are instantly in a state of the most rapid motion. At first we observed only one, which, lifting cautiously in some water in the hollow of the hand, we dropped into a little rock-pool, where we could better observe its evolutions. We could then inspect, not only its external workmanship, but also its internal machinery; for it was so transparent, that we could see into its very core. Alas for us frail mortals, if our neighbours could see into our hearts! But though they cannot, we should not forget that there is One who not only can, but does, search all hearts, and who understands all the imaginations of the thoughts. "He who formed the eye, shall He not see?" He that made the heart, shall He not know all that passes therein? When we reflect on this, well may we humble ourselves in the dust, and 66 cry: Behold, we are vile; what shall we answer thee?" Lord, be merciful to us sinners; behold us in the face of thine Anointed; blot out our iniquities, and accept us in the Beloved. Awake! the morning shines, and the fresh field MILTON. habitants of Eastern climes; but we have no cause to ralist, when Nature has, as it were, turned over a Though at first we observed only one solitary hour. When angels revolted, for reasons not revealed to us, 1 |