tastes to linguistic study. And when they have settled the reading of some disputed passage, or discovered the meaning of a doubtful text in a pagan poet, they fold their arms, and sit down in the grandeur of self-satisfaction, as if they had attained the highest achievement of which the human mind is capable. But, alas! how have they all deceived themselves! The great universe of uncreated glory remains unthought of. While they have been rubbing and polishing the eighteenth part of a pin, in intellectual matters, the infinite themes of thought, which open, and widen, and deepen all around them, have been completely eclipsed. Well may we say, "Alas, poor human reason! led away by a phantom from the eternal substance, and by a glow-worm's night-fire from the sunshine of unspeakable glory!"

This brings us back to the proposition, that piety opens to us the highest themes of meditation, and interests us in them. It gives to God the same place in human esteem that he holds in the universe he has created, where he is all in all. It renders him the most interesting object on which the mind can fix its contemplations, yea, the centre of all; they all lie in circles, nearer or more remote; and while it wanders among them, a sort of holy gravitation is perpetually attracting it back to him, the glorious centre. Its holiest and dearest meditations concern his being and attributes; his laws and their operation, both in the material and mental worlds. All those operations become hallowed, because they are perceived to be the operations of God, the sure evidences of his presence in all his works. All the wonders of nature, by sea and land, on the earth below and in the heavens above, the clouds and storms, the thunder and lightning, the earthquake and the tempest, the rain and the dew, are notes, which recall to memory the holy and ennobling themes of its thought. They are all made the occasions of employing the mind on meditations, such as are calculated to bring out and train its loftiest powers. The means provided for the salvation of a guilty world, on which others look as a cold and cheerless subject, the sanctified heart finds full of all interest and all excellence. The wonders of God's condescension and of the Saviour's work make the soul overflow with emotions that cannot be told. Here is food which satisfies the hungerings and thirstings of the mind, a well of water springing up into everlasting life," a source of mental enlargement and mental enjoyment, of which the unconverted man has never had a conception: These meditations, with the thoughts of a heaven, where the soul will still continue its expansion, and scenes adapted to its peculiar tastesof spirits, that have enjoyed since their creation the teachings of

66

God in his own abode, and with whom it is to have eternal intercourse, serve not only to entrance, but to enlarge the mind-not only to fill the powers now trained, but to train those which are now dormant-not only to refresh and rejoice the energies that are already awake, but to summon every faculty and kindle every energy into almost divine action. This is but a slight view of the new world, into which we are brought by piety-but a feeble exhibition of those sources of mental development, which to the unconverted are sealed fountains. But if such meditations are calculated to open the faculties of the mind more than any others, which we think cannot be denied, or even if they be capable of adding a particle to the development of those faculties, of which we are sure, then piety is essential to the perfection of mental culture. And this, the leading of the mind to themes of the highest character, and interesting it in them, is one of the ways by which the result is effected.

(To be Concluded in our next.)

THE FAMILY DELIVERANCE.

THE following narrative, translated from the Danish, of Pastor Rhone, of Elsineur, cannot but be interesting to our readers::

Many years ago, several German families left their country, and settled in North America. Amongst these was a man from Wurtemburg, who, with his wife and large family, established himself in Pennsylvania. There were no churches or schools then in that neighbourhood, and he was obliged to be satisfied with keeping the Sabbath at home with his family, and instructing them himself to read the Bible and pray to God. He used very often to read the Bible to them, and always used first to say, "Now, my children, be still and listen to what I am going to read, for it is God who speaks to us in this book." In the year 1754, a dreadful war broke out in Canada, between the French and the English. The Indians took part with the French, and made excursions as far as Pennsylvania, where they plundered and burnt all the houses they came to, and murdered the people. In 1755, they reached the dwelling of the poor family from Wurtemburg, while the wife and one of the sons were gone to a mill, four miles distant, to get some corn ground. The husband, the eldest son, and two little girls, named Barbara and Regina, were at home. The father and his son were instantly killed by the savages, but they carried the two little girls away into captivity, with a great many other children, who were taken in the same manner. They were led many miles through woods and thorny bushes, that nobody might follow them. In this condition they were brought to the habitations of the Indians, who divided among themselves all the children whom they had taken captives. Barbara was at this time ten years old, and Regina nine. It was never known what became of Barbara; but Regina,

with a little girl of two years old, whom she had never seen before, were given to an old widow, who was a very cruel woman. Her only son lived with her and maintained her, but he was sometimes from home for weeks together, and then these poor little children were forced to go into the forests to gather roots or other provisions for the old woman; and when they did not bring her enough to eat, she would beat them in so cruel a manner that they were near being killed. The little girl always kept close to Regina, and when she knelt down under a tree, and repeated those prayers to the Lord Jesus, and those hymns which her father had taught her, then the little girl prayed with her, and learned the hymns and prayers by heart. In this melancholy state of slavery these children remained nine long years, till Regina reached the age of nineteen, and her little companion was eleven years old. They were both fine-looking girls, particularly Regina. While captives, their hearts seemed to have always been drawn towards what was good. Regina continually repeated the verses from the Bible and the hymns which she had learnt when at home, and she had taught them to the little girl. They often used to cheer each other with one hymn from the hymn-book used at Halle, in Germany:

"Alone, yet not alone am I,

Though in this solitude so drear."

They constantly hoped that the Lord Jesus would, some time, bring them back to their Christian friends. In 1764 their hope was realized. The merciful providence of God brought the English Colonel Bonquet to the place where they were in captivity. He conquered the Indians, and forced them to ask for peace. The first condition he made was, that they should restore all the prisoners they had taken. Thus the two poor girls were released. More than four hundred captives were brought to Colonel Bonquet. It was a painful sight to see so many young people wretched and distressed. The colonel and his soldiers gave them food and clothes, and Colonel Bonquet brought them all to a town called Carlisle, and published in the Pennsylvania newspapers, that all parents who had lost their children might come to this place, and in case of their finding them, they should be restored to them. Poor Regina's sorrowing mother came, among many other bereaved parents, to Carlisle; but, alas! her child had become a stranger to her Regina had acquired the appearance and manner, as well as the language of the natives. The poor mother went up and down amongst the young persons assembled, but by no efforts could she discover her daughters. She wept in bitter grief and disappointment. Colonel Bonquet said, "Do you recollect nothing by which your children might be discovered ?" She answered, that she recollected nothing but a hymn, which she used often to sing with them, and which was as follows: "Alone, yet not alone am I,

Though in this solitude so drear;

I feel my Saviour always nigh,
He comes the weary hours to cheer.
I am with him, and he with me,
Ev'n here alone I cannot be."

The colonel desired her to sing this hymn.

Scarcely had the mother

sung two lines of it, when Regina rushed from the crowd, began to sing it also, and threw herself into her mother's arms. They both wept for joy, and the colonel restored the daughter to her mother. But there were no parents or friends in search of the other little girl; it is supposed that they were all murdered; and now the child clung to Regina, and would not let her go; and Regina's mother, though very poor, took her home with her. Regina repeatedly asked after "the book in which God speaks to us." But her mother did not possess a Bible; she had lost every thing when the natives burnt her house. She resolved to go to Philadelphia and buy one there, but the pastor, Muhlenburg, of that place, gave her one. It was most extraordinary that Regina still retained her early instructions, and was able to read it immediately.

In how remarkable a manner did the Lord realize his words, "Every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened."

And what reward did the mother, who had diligently taught her children while yet in infancy, the word of God, receive in finding her lost daughter, by the means of those instructions! Why do so many parents forget to communicate this best of gifts to their children! To dress and adorn them, to leave to them earthly treasures, to advance them in their life-time to honour and dignities, these they trouble themselves much about: but to teach them to know their Saviour, to pray to him, to believe in him, to love and obey him; how many forget these things! But what folly! For "what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?"

THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE.

BY MRS. CAMERON.

(Concluded from page 74.)

Now indeed was the dawning of better things, not only with me, but with my aunt; the Holy Spirit was descending as dew, or small rain, upon our hearts, but with more speedy and decided effect upon my aunt's than on mine. This may be thought remarkable, considering our respective ages, but my aunt had been previously subjected to severe bodily and mental suffering; the divine influences were, therefore, in her case, as the rain upon the mown grass; whereas they found me strong in the pride of my own strength, and lifting my branching head as the cedar to the skies. The stock which is to be grafted must be stripped of its natural branches, it must feel the pruning-knife, and must be laid bare to the quick.

My aunt was already become a willing listener; the deaf ear had already been unstopped, and she hearkened with delight whilst Maria repeated to her many of her departed mother's remarks and sentiments, and read to her many of her favourite portions of Scripture.

In the mean time I was slowly returning from the state of my selfconstituted banishment, mingling again in the society of my cousins,

who had the prudence, hardly to have been expected at their ages, to make no manner of comments upon the capriciousness of my behaviour. At the same time I began to take up the religious books which lay in my way, and to read them when I thought myself unobserved. My next step was to read them more publicly, and soon after this I began to listen with interest to any profitable discourse which might be passing in my presence. And who will marvel at this change in my tastes and employments, when I inform them that I had already been brought to secret prayer, not to formal repetition of words, but to earnest, though exceedingly imperfect, supplication for mercy; with a strong and deep sense of my own depravity? for indeed, after I begun to pray in the manner I have spoken of, I experienced such strong and vehement oppositions on the part of my own heart to that which is right, that I was made to feel that if aught depended on myself in the advancement of my salvation, I must be lost for ever. The time was at length arrived in which my aunt and I were to leave this happy place, this land of a second life, as it had proved to us; and I ought to conclude my story with our departure, but I feel that I should not be right in so doing, without giving some particulars of a conversation which passed between me and my eldest cousin, before we left her father's house.

We were walking together on that terrace-walk which I have before described, and which commands a view of a distant range of mountains, rising above a lovely and fertile valley, at that time enriched with every variety of summer's beauty. My heart was more than usually softened by the prospect of my speedy separation from a place and friends who were again become as dear to me as they had been in the days of infancy. Our conversation turned at first upon days long past, brought strongly before us by every surrounding object; we spoke of my beloved departed aunt, a subject on which Maria always delighted to expatiate, and her daughter described the last scene of her happy and useful course, repeating to me many things which she had said on her death-bed, and thus giving me opportunity to remark how faithfully her children had followed her dying injunctions. "We have tried so to do," she replied.

"Certainly," I returned, "I do see many things in a very different light from what I did when I first came here, and yet I cannot account for some parts of your conduct."

"What are these?" she asked.

"I wonder at your being so contented in this retirement; you seem to have no wish to see and be seen; you are entirely occupied by your father, your brothers, and sisters, your household cares, and the neighbouring poor; is it possible that no thoughts of self, or of your future prospects, should ever cross your mind?"

I thought Maria blushed as I urged this searching question; her reply was to this effect:

"The heart of man is desperately wicked, who can know it? I have no strength in myself, Fanny. My dear mother has often taught me, and my Bible also teaches me, that the way of duty is the way of peace. I know that whoever seeks the kingdom of God, and his