Hence we learn the only clear and consistent facts that account for all with which to-day experience is conversant. On the one hand, degradation, which implies a forsaking and a loss of better things once possessed, sin, diseases, misery, and the grave; on the other, a nature with traces still of a nobleness witnessing to a Divine original, with dim recollections and regrets, with yearnings after a lost paradise, -with aspirations which point to a paradise regained. Conscious as we are of this twofold character, the only solution of its causes is to be found in the simple story of the inspired Hebrew recorder of

"Man's first disobedience, and the fruit Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste Brought death into our world and all our woe, With loss of Eden, tili one greater man Restore us and regain the blissful seat." While the memorial of the earlier history of God's chosen people, presenting to us the history of a Providence that has not forsaken the world and its children, sup

plies consolation, and strength, and wisdom to the devout mind in all after time.

The wise and humble christian will always regard the whole volume of divine truth as a spacious field, divided into various compartments, but forming one sublime and beautiful whole. He will walk in every part of it with a devout and teachable mind, everywhere beholding the ways, feeling the presence, and hearing the voice, of Jehovah. At the foot of Sinai he will tremble: he will repose on Calvary. He will learn lessons of piety and virtue from the ancient patriarchs, from Moses and the prophets; and he will not fail to appreciate his own inestimable privileges, as he recalls the language of Christ: "Blessed are your eyes, for they see; and your ears, for they hear. Verily I say unto you, Many prophets and righteous men desired to see the things ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear the things ye hear, and have not heard them."

THE DYING REQUEST OF THE

INFIDEL'S DAUGHTER.

If success in society constituted happiness, Mr. Breynton, of Beech Abbey, would have been an enviable man. With ample means, popular manners, a vast store of information, and singular aptness in imparting it— no small share of the homage of the world fell to Mr. Breynton's lot. But with all these elements of happiness Mr. Breynton was a saddened man. To the support arising from settled religious convictions he was a stranger. "I worship"-he was accustomed to say to his three motherless daughters, from whose education a religious creed was systematically excluded-"I worship THE SUPREME in his works. I adore his omnipotence in the starry firmament on a cloudless night. I trace his bounty in the fields of waving corn,-his love of order in the undeviating succession of the seasons,his ever watchful providence in the ceaseless ebb and flow of ocean. The sun images out to me his all-pervading bounty. The sea mirrors to me his fathomless eternity." But with natural objects his religious impressions terminated. Mr. Breynton was an infidel!

There is not upon earth a more painful

spectacle than that of a gifted and accomplished WORLDLING.

When infinite pains and measureless care are bestowed upon preserving the outward tabernacle to the utter forgetfulness of the immortal spirit within,-when what is earthly and temporal is preferred to what is spiritual and eternal,-oh, what a melancholy perversion is it of the great purposes of our being!

It was thus with those three graceful girls who shared with their misguided parent the splendid seclusion of Beech Abbey. Exterior grace, personal elegance, an easy and winning address-these were points on which the most sedulous attention was successfully bestowed; but no one effort was made to inculcate religious principles, or to plume the soul for a final flight to a blissful and eternal home.

But in no human breast hath the Almighty Governor left himself without a witness. There were moments when the thought of his own inevitable dissolution-of the dark, uncertain, fathomless future-shot like an ice-bolt through the sceptic's frame. “The spirit can never die !"-he would often murmer to himself" How will that future affect it? Then, again, as to those I leave

behind me?"

And in an instant fancy would picture to him the dependent state of those fondly-cherished beings who had such paramount claims upon him, and whom his demise would render destitute. "They will be orphans "-was his oft-repeated conclusion-"portionless-homeless -friendless!"

But the prospect of poverty and dependence for his children was not the evil which Mr. Breynton had to dread. About a dozen miles from the Abbey lived a Mrs. Egerton, a lady of large fortune, who had been an early friend of its former mistress. After Mrs. Breynton's death, mere formal civilities had been interchanged between Mrs. Egerton and the widower. This was the result of his religious creed. But her heart still clung with affection to the children of her early friend; and no fitting opportunity did she allow to slip of proving to them that the memory of their mother was still dear to her. An accident terminated abruptly and unexpectedly Mrs. Egerton's life. She had no near relatives: and, to the utter -consternation of a large circle of legacyhunting acquaintance, it appeared that she had bequeathed the bulk of her property to Eleanor, Mr. Breynton's youngest daughter "because, from all she could hear or learn respecting her, she bore, both in temper and disposition, no faint resemblance to her sainted mother."

Never was there a will which caused such abundant dissatisfaction. "It was cruel""It was unnatural"-"It was unreasonable." And in this outcry none joined more lustily than the friends of a little girl called Rachel Rendlesham, whose beauty had won for her the notice of Mrs. Egerton; who had fondled her; caressed her; estranged her from her parents; monopolized her affection; and had then forgotten her! There was not the slightest mention made of her, or the most scanty provision allotted her in the will. The omission was to her parents a source of the most bitter disappointment: their joy, therefore, was proportionate at learning that the circumstance had been favourably represented to Mrs. Egerton's heiress, and that sunshine would again be restored to the little Rachel's prospects. This was Eleanor's earliest care on succeeding to her property. It proved, if nothing more, that from the selfishness which wealth too often brings along with it, her heart was yet free.

Ah, she little knew the influence which

the youthful Rachel was to exercise on her afterlife! A very brief interval elapsed after her future fortunes had been placed on a firm basis, ere her youthful protectress paid her a visit. The little girl was silent and dispirited. Eleanor addressed her simply, mildly, tenderly. "I like you," said the little girl: "you are something resembling Mrs. Egerton. Mrs. Egerton is gone to heaven. They tell me you are now in Mrs. Egerton's place. But oh, you will never-never-be my dear Mrs. Egerton to

me!"

The sweet clear voice in which this outbreak was uttered-the calm, deliberate manner in which it was given-sensibly affected her to whom it was addressed.

Horrified at this frank confession, and fearful of the consequences, the mistress fidgetted, and fumed, and fretted, and bustled about; and, as a total change of subject, bid the little mourner bring her sampler, and her stitching, and her versebook, for Miss Breynton's inspection.

The little girl was proof against all entreaties. "No!" said she, addressing Eleanor, "I would rather repeat to you the two texts I learnt for Mrs. Egerton. They were the last I ever said to her. Ah, I shall never see, or say them to her again! She used to talk to me much about JESUS CHRIST. She is with him now! Yes: she is with him now!" And then, as if it were a relief to her little over-charged spirit, she slowly repeated in her plaintive but most musical voice: "He that hath the Son of God hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God, hath not life." "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life: no man cometh unto the Father but by Me."

Eleanor listened to her little monitress with deep emotion. Thoughts equally new and startling flashed across her mind.

"You must return with me," was her address to the delighted Rachel: "and let your text-book and your verse-book accompany you."

Not a word was spoken during the drive to the Abbey; but the little girl was happy; for once more was she fondly caressed and kindly smiled on.

And Eleanor's thoughts, whither-whither did they wing? For the first time, to the world beyond the grave-to the home of the disembodied spirit-to the final resting place of the soul.

The impression made that hour, God's grace never permitted to fade.

"It is as I expected. The Religionists have got hold of her," was Mr. Breynton's conclusion, as Eleanor drove off with her sisters one wet and gloomy morning to church. "The books I have seen on her work-table, the strangely-altered tone of her conversation,-her sudden subscription to the Sunday school,-alike convince me that she has surrendered her mind to the influence of superstition. But she seems happy: and a kinder, a more affectionate, a more dutiful daughter never slumbered beneath the shelter of a father's roof. We cannot both be right," he continued musingly; "if there be, as she would fain persuade me, a future state of righteous retribution, my prospects are gloomy enough. I have a great stake upon this die. But there is no such state," said he boldly, "the belief in it is inculcated by interested men solely for their own special benefit. 'Man goeth to his LONG HOME!' Is it not written So? His LONG home-a long, long sleep in the grave.

Shew me the being that has

returned from thence, and I will prepare for a future state like the rest. No, no, christianity is false: that is my fixed and firm conviction. And yet," added he, after a pause, "in spite of this conviction, christianity MAY be true; and I may wake again in another world to prove it!" There was agony in the thought. He shook with ungovernable emotion, as the words rose to his lips; and rushing into the air, traversed for hours his splendid domain in the vain effort to escape from himself!

For some months Beech Abbey had ceased to be to Eleanor a happy home. Her father's opinions differed so materially from her own on the most momentous of all subjects; there was such an evident disinclination on his part to allow christianity to receive any acknowledgment in his household; that Eleanor felt the bondage of his creed had become a burden too heavy to be borne.

Perhaps, too, the attentions which she had for some time past received from Mr. Walter de Mowbray, the nephew and heir of the Earl of Wharfedale, and which her heart had whispered were but too grateful to her, might have had some little influence in maturing this conclusion. At length her union with Mr. De Mowbray was resolved upon. Lord Wharfedale did not dissemble his satisfaction at the proposed connexion. By Mr. Breynton it was hailed with that deep and passionate exultation so peculiarly

characteristic of an ambitious spirit. But at that very moment, when he thought his position so firm and his prospects so brilliant when he fondly deemed "the glory of his house to be increased," the HAND was uplifted to strike the blow by which all his plans and projects were to be crumbled into dust.

Splendid was the banquet, and sparkling the conversation, and titled the manly forms, and fair the beaming faces that met at Wharfedale Castle, on the eighteenth of June, in honour of the approaching nuptials of its heir. No distinct intimation was given; but with each guest there seemed a tacit understanding that this re-union ratified the long-pending alliance between the Breyntons and De Mowbrays.

Never had Eleanor appeared more beautiful; or her father so self-possessed, calm, and happy.

The bride elect, with her father, quitted the Castle early; for the distance to the Abbey was considerable, and the road in more parts than one wretchedly bad. Whether to this fact the sad result should be ascribed, or to the deep potations which, at the Castle, had been pressed upon the postilion in honour of his young mistress, cannot well be ascertained; but midway between the Abbey and Wharfedale the carriage was overturned. Its inmates were speedily extricated; both, it was thought and hoped, without injury. But such was not the result. Immediately on reaching home Eleanor retired to her room, complaining of intense pain in her limbs. A violent inflammatory attack came on, which yielded only to the most vigorous treatment; and left behind it symptoms of rapid and confirmed consumption.

The anxiety-the agony-the restlessness of Mr. Breynton, the fever of apprehension in which he passed day after day, defy description. The medical attendants were pained and perplexed by his agitated and incessant enquiries; the more so, because they felt they could hold out no hope.

"We will not deceive you, Mr. Breynton," was the reply mournfully given by the leading physician; "your daughter's cure is beyond the reach of medical skill. Her case is so hopeless, and there is so much suffering before her, that the best wish her most attached friend can form for her is a happy death."

"A happy death! a happy death!" repeated the infidel father in a tone of bitter

her situation, her whole attention was bestowed in preparing her father and sisters for the event, and endeavouring to reconcile the former to what was inevitable. His grief was frightful. It was daring, outrageous, defying. It was not the "godly sorrow that worketh repentance;" it was "the sorrow of the world that worketh death!"

At the earnest request of De Mowbray, she saw him twice and alone. What passed at the second and final interview never transpired. But the young man quitted her chamber under the influence of emotion that deprived him of utterance.

"I am calmer this evening, father," said the dying Eleanor; "more free from pain, and better able to converse than I have been for many days. Sit down, then, near me,-close-close by my side."

In moody silence the stern parent seated himself by his dying child.

"Father!" said she, after a long pause, "we shall know each other, we shall surely know each other when we meet on the resurrection morning."

"Is there a resurrection ?" said he huskily, and with evident emotion.

"Yes," she returned, solemnly, "both of the just and of the unjust."

"Eleanor!" said the infidel, resolutely, and almost sternly, "let not the phantasies which pain and weakness often bring over the intellect permanently possess you. Such an event is not probable, is not possible!" "Oh, father! father!"

"Listen to me. The body after death is resolved into dust. That dust is in many cases scattered thousands of miles apart; lies in different and distant places. In many instances it has passed into other substances. For example,-some perish beneath the waves of the ocean, and are devoured by the monsters of the deep. The bones of others whiten on the battle plain. The existence of some is terminated amid the burning conflagration. Others find their last resting-place in the parching sands of the desert. Not a few have been torn piecemeal by the ravenous beast of the forest. Reason, therefore, connot conceive,-in truth, reason wholly rejects the doctrine that these particles can be so brought together again; can be so carefully and perfectly combined as to preserve the identity, or in

"No, father, no! It is our last. Such an inward conviction, which I cannot mistake, stamps it. My dear, dear father, surely the closing conversation between parent and child may well be of the things that relate to eternity! You admit, then, the Supreme to be all-mighty ?" "I do."

"Surely, then, He whose power called man into existence, whose power keeps him in existence, whose power can at any moment terminate his existence, possesses power after death to renew his existence ? In other words, surely, he who was able to make man at first, who is still able to unmake him at any hour in the full vigour of health and strength, can remake him again after death?"

"That argument is not new," returned Mr. Breynton coldly.

"But it is sound; and being based upon truth, cannot be shaken. He who said, 'Let there be light, and there was light,' cannot he regather all, even the minutest particles of a man's body scattered wherever they may be? What imports it, whether these fragments be lying in the blue depths of ocean, or mouldering in the dark and lonely jungle, or enveloped amid the trackless sands of the desert, or bleaching on the summit of the lofty mountain, cannot THE SUPREME Compel them to return in one instant of time to the rest of the mass and recompose the former man? Unquestionably he can. He has but to will, and it is done. As omniscient, he cannot but know where each particle rests. As all-mighty, not one fragment can be beyond the reach of his arm. I grant you that the doctrine

of the resurrection is one which reason could never have taught us. It is peculiarly the doctrine of revelation and it is an allimportant one."

"But in rejecting it I but injure myself." "Rest not, my dear father, on so frail a foundation. The amount of injury done to society by evil example, who can estimate? Here and there an individual may be spared to see the flagitiousness of his own princi

ples, and to repent from the very heart for ever having entertained them; but can he hope the same of others who have imbibed their principles from his lips? Father, you may live to recant. I pray God earnestly, oh, how earnestly, that this may be permitted you; but how few of those who have admired and adopted your principles may ever have the opportunity of being warned by your renunciation of them? The contagion of your unbelief may be diffusing itself in society long, long after you have ceased to have any control over it. You may be doing harm, yes, even in your grave! The poison of your principles may be circulating in many a neighbourhood, many a family, many a bosom: its venom may be operating upon others, may be corrupting the innocent, and drawing down to perdition the unwary, may be swelling deeply, fearfully, overwhelmingly, the amount of your condemnation before God, long after your earthly existence has closed."

Mr. Breynton seemed paralyzed for a moment by the dying girl's earnestness, but recovering himself by a strong effort, observed with a shew of firmness:

"I am too closely rivetted to my opinions, Eleanor, ever to abandon them. I appreciate all your kindness. I can enter into all your anxiety. My creed I cannot alter. Short of this, any request you may make I will solemnly and rigidly fulfil."

"You will?" said she delightedly. "I will, on the word of a father, who has never yet deceived you."

"Then hear the last request-the dying request-of your departing but happy child. Let no evening close, after my death, unsolemnized by the offering of family prayer at the Abbey-when You will promise to be present."

Mr. Breynton started-changed colourattempted to speak-checked himself-and was silent.

"Let my early death be not in vain! No, let my departure be the signal for the family altar being raised in the Abbey where God has hitherto been so little known. I shall then be with you. Yes, in spirit, I shall then be near you. And you, father, will then hold communion with your departed child. You promise me ?"

"I do," he replied with fervid earnestness, "faithfully and unreservedly."

"I am content. God will water the seed sown in his own good time. Now, bid me good-night, and leave me."

She slept after this conversation long and tranquilly. Her cough had left her; and her breathing was as gentle, calm, and regular as that of a slumbering infant. About an hour after midnight her attendants thought they heard her speak. They listened. She was praying earnestly; and they heard her say "finally," for each member of her family. In these closing petitions, the spiritual welfare of her father formed a prominent and affecting topic. She was then silent for some moments. She spoke again. Her sisters and the nurse crept anxiously to her side, for they fancied that her voice sounded fuller and clearer than usual. She had raised herself on her pillow. Her hands were crossed upon her bosom. Her eyes were lifted upwards, as if holding most reverential but delightful communion with an invisible Being; and her whole countenance was irradiated with an indescribable expression of adoring awe, perfect triumph, and holy joy. Then, bending her head in lowliest humility, all around heard her utter clearly and distinctly, as if in answer to some earnest call-"Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth!" One soft and gentle sigh, and all was still.

Such was the confession with which she "passed over Jordan !"

"Our new church rises rapidly," was the remark of an anxious bye-stander in a large manufacturing village where there was a dense population and a lamentable prevalence of infidel sentiments; "but the stranger's earnestness in pressing on the work, and his desire to see it completed, continue without abatement."

"How singular," said another, "that we should owe so great a boon to one who has no connexion with us in point of propertyhad no previous knowledge of us-and possesses no apparent community of feeling with us. His very name is wrapped up in a sort of mystery. In fact, we know as little about him now as when he first broached the project amongst us.”

"It was a happy day for us that brought him here," said the first speaker.

"And for himself also," said another, who came up and joined the group, and who seemed to have a knowledge of some circumstances of which the others were igno

rant.

"Our benefactor was an infidel,-lost an idolized daughter,-had holier and happier views opened to him through a rigid fulfil