OF TEMPTATIONS. Temptations are instructions. He is not over wise that goes out of God's way to escape a cross. God will either keep his saints from temptations by his preventing mercy, or in temptations by his supporting mercy, or find a way for their escape by his delivering mercy. A Christian that lives here among his enemies should never stir out without his guard. If you follow Satan, you will find the tempter prove a tormentor; if you follow the Spirit, you will find the counsellor prove a comforter-Mason. TRUE MARK OF A MINISTER. It seems to me that a minister should endeavour to distinguish himself in no other way from the people of his charge but by presenting himself as a more perfect example of the influence of his religion upon his own character and conduct, and thus endeavour to induce his people, by seeing in him the loveliness of virtue and piety, themselves to embrace and practice them. This is the only legitimate source of influence and respect, and this will always obtain them from all ranks of mankind, as far as they are discovered and understood. Andrews. HUMILITY AND ASPIRATIONS. It is a good thing (says Arnold) to believe; it is a good thing to admire. By continually looking upward, our minds will themselves grow upward; and as a man, by indulging in the habit of scorn and contempt for others, is sure to descend to the level of what he despises, so the opposite habits of admiration and enthusiastic reverence for excellence impart to ourselves a portion of the qualities we admire. Here, as in everything else, humility is the surest path to exaltation. EXPERIENCE OF WHITEFIELD. Oh, what sweet communion had I vouchsafed with God in prayer! How often have I been carried beyond myself; how assuredly I felt that Christ dwelt in me and I in him; and how daily did I walk in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, and was edified and refreshed in the multitude of peace! THE BIBLE IN SWEDEN, NOR WAY, AND FINLAND. In these countries recently 240,500 copies of the New Testament have been circulated, being a copy for every family, and 40,000 for the solitary and homeless. So highly is this agency of colporteurs prized in Sweden, that a school for the training of agents has recently been opened there, and several benevolent men support a number of them; one of them supports seven agents. PERSEVERANCE. Suppose a person deeply perplexed about the state of his soul, continually fluctuating between hope and fear, and overwhelmed with grief, were repeatedly to utter this wish: "Oh that I certainly knew that I should be able to persevere;" he might be answered thus: "And what wouldst thou do if this certain knowledge were bestowed upon thee? Do now that which thou wouldst do, and rest secure of thy perseverance.” HINDOO LIBERALITY. Jamsetjee Jejeebhoy, who, some time since, was made a baronet of the United Kingdom, is said to have distributed £110,000 among the members of his faith in India, and a like sum among persons of all sects for charitable, benevolent, and public purposes. His influence with the Parsees is great. He was born in Bombay, and is the architect of his own immense fortune. TEARS AND LAUGHTER. God made both tears and laughter, and both for kind purposes; for as laughter enables mirth and surprise to breathe freely, so tears enable sorrow to vent itself patiently. Tears hinder sorrow from becoming despair and madness, and laughter is one of the very privileges of reason, being confined to the human species. WESLEYANS IN FRANCE. The Wesleyans in France maintain 136 pulpits and 78 preachers of various grades, 29 Sabbath-schools, churches numbering 1,130 members, and congregations amounting to 15,000 hearers. SELECT SENTENCES. We are so far Christians as we can rule ourselves according to the rule of God; the rest is but form and speculation. Death hath nothing terrible in it but what our life hath made so. The sins of teachers are the teachers of sins. Knowledge helps much to practice, and practice helps much to knowledge; for "If any man do my will, he shall know the doctrine whether it be of God." If that servant were condemned that gave God his own, what will become of them that rob God of his own? Saints desire so to meet God, as that they may part no more; and so to part with sin, as that they may meet no more. A godly man is as willing that the kingdom of God should come into him, as he is to go into the kingdom of God. We are not elected because we are holy; but (for) we are elected that we may be holy. Seeing God doth all things well, we should think well of all things which God doth. God sometimes puts his people to a little pain, that he may give them much ease. In prayer the heart should first speak the words, and then the words should speak the heart. A part of the Christian's evening prayer is, that he may not sleep in his sin, nor sin in his sleep. IT is much to be desired that there might be a republication of the Lives of the Pilgrim Fathers; or rather, perbaps, that a Series of Memoirs of them should be prepared. Who so fit for this interesting and important task as the excellent Editor of the excellent Year Book? The following are some of the facts of the history of one, and a chief, of these glorious men. The Rev. John Cotton, born at Derby on the 4th of December, 1585, was a son of Rowland Cotton, Esq., a lawyer, and a gentleman of honourable descent. Having studied with Mr. Johnson, of the Derby Grammar School, he entered Trinity College, Cambridge, early in the year 1598, at twelve years of age, and was admitted Master of Arts in 1606. He became fellow of Emanuel College, and, as head lecturer, dean, and catechist, was much beloved by the students. At twenty-two years of age, he became famous, through the whole University, by a funeral oration upon Dr. Soame, master of Peter House, who died in 1608; and he gained still greater applause, soon after, by a sermon delivered at St. Mary's, the University Church. Mr. Cotton, after his conversion under the ministry of Mr. William Perkins, and especially by means of a sermon from Dr. Richard Sibbes, again preached at St. Mary's, in 1609. The church was filled with gentlemen of the University, whose expectations were raised by his previous success. Instead of an elaborate discourse from the ambitious scholar and divine, they heard a pungent and practical sermon on repentance. The disappointment of the vice-chancellor and audience was apparent, and Mr. Cotton retired to his chamber discouraged and with a heavy heart; but he was very soon cheered by a visit from one of his hearers, Mr. Preston, fellow of Queen's College, and of great note in the University, who told him "how it had pleased God to work effectually upon his heart by that sermon; and, conferring with Mr. Cotton, he studied wholly for the ministry. Mr. Preston was chaplain to the Prince of Wales, preacher at Lincoln's Inn, COTTON. Master of Emanuel College, lecturer of Trinity College, Cambridge, and a learned writer. From that time, he greatly valued Mr. Cotton's friendship, and visited him as often as once a year at Boston. Having resided at Cambridge "not above fourteen years," Mr. Cotton was chosen Vicar of Boston, in Lincolnshire, on the 4th of July, 1612, but not without opposition from Barlow, the bishop of the diocese," who told him he was a young man, and unfit to be over such a factious people," who were imbued with the Puritan spirit; but the bishop was conciliated by Simon Bibye, whose influence had been solicited by some of Mr. Cotton's friends, but without his knowledge. Several agreeable incidents connect this gentleman's name with the family history. His daughter became the wife of Sir Edward Lake, LL.D., chancellor of the diocese of Lincoln, whose niece, Ann Lake, was the wife of Mr. Cotton's grandson, the Rev. John Cotton, of Hampton, New Hampshire, and, by a second marriage, the wife of the Rev. Dr. Increase Mather, whose father, the Rev. Richard Mather, was also befriended by Mr. Bibye, when in similar difficulties with the bishop at Toxteth, in November, 1633. い In February, 1630, by the advice of his physicians, Mr. Cotton's labours were suspended for a year or more, most of which time he passed, by invitation, at the Earl of Lincoln's. Here his wife, Mrs. Elizabeth Horrocks, died about the close of that year. When Mr. Cotton took his degree of Bachelor of Divinity, at Cambridge, about six months after his settlement at Boston, his latin sermon, Concio ad Clerum, “was very much admired, and applauded more than he desired." His text was from Matt. v. 13; "in handling of which, both the matter and the rhetorical strains, elegancy of phrase, and sweet and grave pronunciation, rendered him yet more famous in the University. And so did his answering of the Divinity Act in the schools, though he had a very nimble opponent, Mr. William Chappel," afterwards Provost of Trinity College, Dublin. He was eminently successful in his ministry, and Mr. Whiting gives an almost incredible account of his labours in the next twenty years of his life. This biographer says that he was of admirable candour, unparalleled meekness, rare wisdom, and was exceedingly loved of the best. His nonconformity was tolerated for a while, without disturbance, and was gradually embraced, in practice, "by the chief and greatest part of the town." Dr. Williams, Bishop of Lincoln, and the successor of Lord Bacon, as keeper of the great seal, "went to King James, and, speaking of Mr. Cotton's great learning and worth before him, the king was willing, notwithstanding his nonconformity, to give way, that he should have liberty to go on without interruption in his ministry; which was very marvellous, considering how that the king's spirit was carried out against such men." But the tyrant Laud, a fit successor to Bonner, gave him no peace; and, on the 5th of July, 1633, he resigned the vicarage. He was concealed for a while at London, changed his dress, travelled under an assumed name, and, about the 13th of July, took passage at the Downs, thus eluding the hounds of the High Commission Court, who had long sought for him, and who expected the vessel would touch at the Isle of Wight. Mr. Cotton was accompanied by his second wife, Mrs. Sarah Story (the mother of all his children,) who, on the 12th August, on the Atlantic, gave birth to their first child, whom they christened Seaborn. He was minister of Hampton, New Hampshire. A voyage of seven weeks brought them, on the 4th of September, to Boston, which town, Hutchinson remarks, was said to have been so named from Mr. Cotton, whom they expected to join them. Some of the most prominent and valuable citizens of Boston, from personal attachment to Mr. Cotton, followed him in his involuntary removal to New England. He here continued his habits of severe labour. He allayed the rising difficulties in the settlement, and, says Hutchinson, "is supposed to have been more instrumental in the settlement of their civil as well as ecclesiastical polity, than any other person." In the year 1636, Lord Say and Sele enclosed in a confidential letter to Mr. Cotton, proposals from himself, Lord Brooke, and other persons of quality, as conditions of their removing to New England. Mr. Cotton replied to the letter, "What your Lordship writeth of Dr. Twisse, his works De Scientia Media, and of the Sabbath, it did refresh me to reade, that his labours of such arguments were like to come to light; and it would refresh me much more to see them here; though (for my owne particular) till I gett some release from some constant labors here (which the church is desirous to procure), I can get little or noe opportunity to reade anything, or attend to anything, but the dayly occurrences which presse in upon me continually, much beyond my strength, either of body or mind." He then considers at length some of the principles involved in their proposals, and thus concludes: "I have delivered an answer to the rest of your demands according to the mindes of such leading men amongst us as I thought meet to consult withall, concealing your name from any, except two or three," -referring, probably, to Winthrop and Dudley, and perhaps Bradstreet or Bellingham. These papers, preserved in full in the appendix to Hutchinson's history, are a compendium of his political principles. They manifest the general opinion, both in England and the Colony, that he was the man, the presiding spirit in founding those civil and religious institutions, the essential principles of which are the peculiar blessings of America. The Having been requested by the General Court to assist in compiling a body of fundamental laws, he presented a model, at a session in 1636, understood to have been the work chiefly of himself and Mr. Bellingham. historian, Hutchinson, says that he had seen "the first draught of the law by Mr. Cotton." This was not adopted; but another, supposed to be the joint labour of Mr. Cotton and Sir Henry Vane, embodying the same general principles, was printed in London in 1641. In the same year, some of the principal men in both houses of Parliament intended to have sent a ship to convey Mr. Cotton to England; but, from the delay of Oliver Cromwell and others in writing to and entreating him and a few leading colonists to return to aid in public affairs, and from the rapid development of the revolutionary events, his acceptance of the invitation was prevented. Whiting, Clarke, Norton, Hubbard, Mather, Hutchinson, Eliot, Allen, Savage, McClure, and minor writers, have commemorated his life. A list of his published works is given in Emerson's "History of the First Church in Boston." "He was a good Hebraist, a critic in Greek, and could, with great facility, both speak and write Latin, in a pure and elegant Ciceronian style; and was a good historian." "His library was great, his reading and learning answerable, himself a living and better library." "He had a clear, neat, audible voice, easily heard in the most capacious auditory." His complexion was fair, sanguine, clear: his hair was once brown, "but, in his later years, as white as the driven snow.' "In his countenance was an inexpressible sort of majesty, which commanded respect from all that approached him." He was of medium stature, and inclined to corpulency. He was distinguished for his hospitality. While crossing the ferry, to preach at Cambridge, he took cold, and died December 23rd, 1652, in his 58th year; and on the 29th was carried on the shoulders of his fellow ministers from his dwelling in Tremont-street, and deposited in a brick tomb in King's Chapel burial ground. Funeral sermons were delivered by the Rev. Richard Mather, Rev. John Davenport, and by the clergy generally. There were "funeral poems in abundance." "New England mourned for her loss." The genealogy of his family may be found in the "New England Historical and Genealogical Register," vol. i., pp. 164-166, vol. vi., pp. 20, 21, and in Bridgman's "Copp's Hill Epitaphs," p.202. Among his descendants in the female line are the names Everett, Jackson, Lee, Mather, Swett, Thayer, Thornton, and many others. We close with Woodbridge's celebrated epitaph on this great man :— "A living, breathing Bible; tables where Both covenants at large engraven were; Gospel and law in 's heart had each its column; His hand an index to the sacred volume; GEORGE G. BLAKESTON, OF GREAT DRIFFIELD, YORKSHIRE. GEORGE G. BLAKESTON was born at Driffield in the year 1828 or 1829, of parents comparatively poor, but honest and industrious. At an early age he was left fatherless, and was thrown upon the world to provide for himself. When only ten years old he entered the service of a tradesman of his native town in the humble capacity of errand boy. Here, by industry and good behaviour, he speedily secured the favourable notice of his employers, and continued to receive the evidences of their appreciation of his services in a series of promotions, until at length he occupied the most confidential and responsible position in their establishment, which he filled at the time of his decease, having been in their employ, with the exception of two brief intervals, from the day on which he entered upon the duties of the errand boy to the present time. He was the helper of his widowed mother until her death, which occurred about ten years ago, when he became a father to his orphan brothers and sister, and a faithful protector to an aged grandmother, educating and apprenticing the former, and mainly supporting all. When about fifteen years of age he was induced to attend the eminently valuable and evangelical ministry of the late Rev. Henry Birch, pastor of the Independent church at Driffield, and soon after became the subject of deep spiritual concern. About that time an extensive religious awakening was experienced amongst the Wesleyans of that district, and several young men, his companions, were then led to Christ. He occasionally attended their meetings for prayer, and at one of these, early on a Sabbath morning, he found that peace with God, through the Lord Jesus Christ, which he had. so long desired. He then sought intercourse with his own pastor, and by him was confirmed in his "belief of the truth;" and, on the first Sabbath of September, 1845, with another young man (the writer of this paper), was received into the communion of the church. Both the pastor and George, as well as the good man who was the first to give the young communicants a brother's welcome, have been, we trust and believe, received by the blessed Head over all into the holy fellowship of the church not made with hands, and the companion only remaineth here; but the circumstances of that afternoon will never cease to be remembered by him. On the day of his reception into the church, George commenced a career of Christian service, to which he was earnestly devoted, and in which he was eminently successful. His first labours were in the Sabbath-school, and here he distinguished himself by his affection for the youths who had the advantage of his teaching and his concern for their spiritual welfare. To be a Sabbath-school teacher was, in his esteem, an honour and a privilege. He did not discharge the duties of the office for the mere gratification of his own fancy; to give an hour or two on the Sabbath to the young was not a mere filling up of time with him, it was an earnest business; he felt that he was doing a work for Christ, and, therefore, he was entire hearted in it. His desire was, that his youths might become the children of God by faith in Jesus Christ; and all his instructions tended towards the attainment of that desire. He not only taught them the letter of the word, but desired them to appreciate its spirit, and, therefore, he prayed much both with and for them; and secured their affections to such an extent, that they were accustomed to look up to him as their friend as well as teacher; and much good, we are persuaded, has been accomplished through his earnest and faithful labours in this branch of Christian service. He subsequently filled the office of superintendent, and discharged its duties with equal diligence and fidelity. Besides the duties of the Sabbathschool, he was a zealous helper in the cause of social reform. He was a total abstainer, and took an active part in the management of the affairs of the local Temperance Society, and acted as one of its vice-presidents, and then as president, for some years; and his voice was often heard in advocacy of the principles to which he so consistently adhered in practice. He had a peculiar relish for the sweet air of early morning, and was accustomed to take long walks before business hours. He had most delightful communion with the God of nature in some of these morning walks, and has often been observed by his companion on these occasions to be filled with a holy peace and joy. He once said, "When I see a snowdrop, I always thank God for the blessing of eyesight; and when I hear the song of the lark, I always thank him for hearing." He was an interesting companion and a valuable friend; his conversation was "always with grace, seasoned with salt; " and it would be a difficult, if not an impossible thing, for any who have had even the closest intimacy with him to remember any expression, or even word, that had an evil tendency connected with it, having been uttered by him. On account of his cheerful and social nature, and affectionate disposition, he was much respected generally, and was a welcome guest wherever he went. In his business capacity he was distinguished for his diligence, integrity, and obliging deportment; and in this, as in all other respects, was always found on the ascending side of the ladder. He never went downward or backward, but ever forward and upward; he seldom talked of what he intended doing, but did it, and then spoke of what was done. Notwithstanding the unfavourable circumstances of his earlier years, and the imperfect education he received, he possessed much information upon many subjects, having considerably improved his mind by careful training and much reading. Being naturally gifted with a readiness of expression, and being a close observer of public speakers, he became a fluent and pleasing speaker himself, and, for some months past, was accustomed to preach in the neighbouring villages with much acceptance. In the year 1852 he went to reside in York, and remained there about six months; and during that period was in communion with the church under the pastoral charge of the Rev. James Parsons. The ministrations of that gentleman he much valued, but his own pastor, Mr. Birch, was his ideal of a minister, and for him he entertained the highest esteem and affection, and looked up to him with the greatest admiration, and had full confidence in his judgment and advice; and Mr. Birch, on his part, entertained the utmost respect for his devoted friend. At the death of Mr. Birch, which occurred in Oct., 1856, none mourned more deeply than did this young man, who so much valued him during life. George had long felt a desire to |