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ledge. It is in the highest degree important that all should acquire learning. An ignorant man may be compared to a beast, and yet even beasts can converse with their own species without difficulty; man, though by nature far above the beasts, if he be uneducated, cannot converse with his fellow-men without hesitation. An ignorant man is like a forest-tree, and yet it is said in the Madurei (a popular native work), 'Every tree of the forest is good for something or other, but a man who cannot read is fit for nothing;' and this is true. Learning is to him who has acquired it a treasure which never will decrease. A man may heap up untold wealth, but thieves will perhaps deprive him of it: learning cannot be taken away by the robber. Again, if you spend wealth it will decrease; but the more you diffuse your learning among your neighbours, the more abundantly will it increase. Learning may best be acquired at the time when cares are few. This time is youth; but because children have not sense to feel their want of learning, their parents must see them instructed. It is the parents' business to educate their children. theless, many people do not in the least feel that this is their duty, but say that learning has never been thought necessary for the due performance of all observances connected either with their caste or profession. This is quite wrong; for if a man be blind, it is not necessary to put the son's eye out, that he may be as his father was; nor is it necessary, because the father is lame, to amputate the son's leg, that he may be lame also; nor is it necessary, because the father is dumb, to tie up the son's mouth, lest he should speak. If the father be a beggar, and one hundred rupees be given to the son, will he, instead of employing it for his support, throw it away, saying, 'My father begged for his living, and so will I?' But if any one should say, Why should the children learn, since their fathers died without learning? it is equal folly. In the time of childhood the father should endeavour to correct his son's evil propensities, by causing him to be well instructed; otherwise this very subject will cause him much anxiety hereafter. Let us all, then, consider the subject of education as one of primary

importance. He who has been educated will understand the Scriptures better than the uneducated man. When he is able to read the Scriptures for himself, he will feel their power, he will strive to walk, as they direct, in the way of true and heavenly wisdom; and, moreover, he will be able to teach others, and point out the difference between the vain fables of heathenism and the grand truths of Christianity. He will be able to show that the Bible is the work of the unspeakably-glorious God, and to show that to walk according to it is man's interest and duty. Thus may many be saved by his instrumentality. The heathen think that it is not their duty to teach their neighbours, or care for their welfare; and ignorant, uneducated Christians think the same. But an lightened Christian, as soon as he has received the word of God, will feel that it is his duty to teach others what he has himself learnt. Thus they, and those who are set over them, will be daily rejoiced. Let us all strive for the attainment of this end."

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To this I will only add, that the speaker and all his family seem to live in accordance with what he has so emphatically spoken.

EXTRACTS FROM NEWSPAPERS.

INDIAN MEAL.-Among the many advantages attributed to the use of Indian corn meal, the following must not be reckoned among the least of them. It was stated in the Tralee board-room that fever, which has been so prevalent and so fatal about Tralee for some months past, has been discovered to be sensibly on the decline since Indian meal has become so general as an article of food among the people. Another fact connected with the use of this food is, that workmen find that they can work better and longer on a meal of Indian meal bread, than ever they were able to do on even the best potatoes.-Kerry Post.

FANATICISM.-A woman at the Ferry Side, last week, refused to give her son, who had a fever, medicine, on the plea, "If it pleased God he would recover, and if not, he would die." The finale showed that he was to die. It is hardly credible, but nevertheless too true, that in the present day persons are to be found so grossly ignorant.-Carmarthen Journal.

NOTICE TO CORRESPONDENTS.

We have received the communications of E. A.; a Layman; C. M.; L. S. R.; P. S. L.; a Lady's Servant; and X. Y. Z.

THE BLESSINGS OF A MEDIATOR.

"There is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus."

WHEN the children of Israel were called to hold communion with God, after leaving Egypt, they felt the necessity of a Mediator, or of one to speak for them to God, to receive his words and deliver them to them. They did not understand that the Lord had already, in his divine counsels, appointed a Mediator in his dear Son Jesus Christ; and that this great Redeemer was to go before them into Canaan, and to govern and direct them all through their pilgrimage. They thought that God only was at Sinai; and seeing the terrible grandeur of his appearance there, they wished for a human Mediator, whose glory would not dazzle them so fearfully, and make their sinful hearts tremble to behold Him. If they had had a right and intelligent faith, they would have understood that the God who was to go before them was also, in the fulness of time, to become man for their sake, and might therefore already be approached by the believer with the same full confidence and comfort as if VOL. XXVI.

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He were then manifest in the flesh. But they were not all believers-indeed very few of them understood or received the truth; and yet their demand of a Mediator is useful to be considered by us in this paper, as showing what are the spiritual wants of mankind; and how wonderfully God has gone before our wants and desires, in providing, before the foundations of the world were laid, that glorious and blessed Saviour, who has in his own person all the requisite qualities of a perfect Mediator. The Israelites asked for one to be between themselves and God; one able without fear to approach the Deity and hold free communion with Him in order to present their wants and prayers, and plead for their pardon; and yet one who would condescend to hold communion as free and unconstrained with them, to have compassion on their infirmities, and be with them as a brother. This is the meaning of a Mediator. They felt they wanted this; and we all want it. No mortal being, no sinner that ever lived, can approach God without one. Almost every thoughtful person is sensible of the want: and the most degraded and debased transgressors have often confessed how impossible they felt it to go to God alone. From this arises the difficulty of beginning to pray. There is a distance between the sinner and his God-a great gulf between them; it is felt as soon as thought of; and the man exclaims very frequently, in the ear of his pastor or his advising friends, "I cannot pray." Why can he not pray, as well as ask his neighbour for bread, when he is dying of hunger? Even in the hour of his deepest need, he might scruple or scorn to ask his enemy; and he knows in his secret mind that he is at enmity with God, and therefore cannot pray to Him. He could ask his friend; he would cry out boldly to one he knew; he would open his wants at once to his wife or brother: but God is in quite a different relation. He is an injured, an offended, Master, a justly incensed Creator. You may urge and advise him to go to God alone and at once; but you will not persuade him. The strongest and deepest feelings forbid him: he cannot obey you. But if you are able to speak to him of one who can undertake his cause, or plead for him, going between God's

anger and his soul, and speaking that which he cannot dare to speak, you have at once obtained his ear, because you have touched upon his real wants, and provided the needful aid. A Mediator alone is wanted; and if his powers and abilities, his willingness and fitness, are properly explained, the sinner will, in all probability, listen eagerly to the description, and desire to avail himself of the benefit. The perfections of the Lord Jesus Christ, as a Mediator between God and man, are so divine and spiritual, so wonderful and mysterious, that mortal description alone cannot bring home the subject to the mind or heart. To give the words effect the Holy Spirit is granted from above; and he "will take of the things of Christ and show them unto" us. Only when He reveals it, are we aware of the fulness and fitness that are in Christ. Only when He enables us, are we able to feel ourselves drawn to the Saviour, and through Him to the Father. But when they are thus rightly known, the blessings of a Mediator, my dear reader, are inestimable. The benefit and the comfort of possessing one, exceed our utmost desires or wants. In Him we may entirely confide. He has our salvation at heart, and that alone. He died to obtain it, and this only can satisfy Him. He has at heart our present peace also, and our spiritual prosperity. Good will is the first ground of confidence; the Lord Jesus has proved that He possesses it, with the last drops of his sacred blood shed on the cross. The next ground of confidence, is the power to know our minds, and to feel for all we feel. This He has obtained, by putting on our flesh and dwelling in it for more than thirty-three years, in order to experience all its trials, and to know all its infirmities that were not sinful. The next is, his power to prevail with the Father, to intercede successfully in heaven and obtain all his requests. When we know that He is the Son of God, the only begotten and beloved Son, we cannot doubt this; and the word of Scripture assures us that it "Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name He will do it." "I know that Thou hearest me always; nevertheless because of them that stood by I said it, that they might believe." We have now all the

is so.