Whether I am ever to meet the same party again on a similar occasion, is known only to the Lord; but I can say with truth, that no place, no season, no society, ever interested my soul more than the present; and especially while the following hymn was singing by so unusual a number of serious young people and intelligent children, whose understandings and hearts I knew went with the words of their lips.

"Let hearts and tongues unite,
And loud thanksgivings raise!
'Tis duty, mingled with delight,
To sing the Saviour's praise.

When on the breast we hung,

Our help, was in the Lord;
'Twas he first taught our infant tongue
To form the lisping word.

In childhood and in youth,

His eye was on us still,

Though strangers to his love and truth,

And prone to thwart his will.

Now, through another year,

Supported by his care,

We raise our Ebenezer here;

"The Lord hath help'd thus far."

Our state in future years

Since we cannot foresee,

He kindly, to prevent our fears,

Says, "Leave it all to me."

O may we all then cast

Our care upon the Lord!

And praise him for his mercies past,

And trust his promis'd word!"

Most confident am I, that man is justified freely by the grace of God, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus; even by faith without the deeds of the law (Rom. iii. 24-28.); but still I cannot help saying, "O that I had ended all my past days as I ended this."

The morrow or Monday was of course new year's day; a day, whereon thousands of mankind in this land pull down a more than ordinary portion of wrath on themselves by idleness, excess, oaths, and profaneness. On this day, in our villages, as well as in our large towns, the labourer either refrains from his task altogether, or quits it at an earlier hour than usual, to repair to the alehouse, and there hold a great feast unto Baal; while his impoverished wife and children are pining in wretchedness at home. Knowing that several of my young friends would be at leisure in the evening, I gave a general invitation to all who chose to meet and pass a couple of hours in seeking the divine blessing on the succeeding weeks and months, and my room was again nearly filled. I shall not, however, enter into particulars on this occasion: the Christian reader will not doubt my words,

when I say we found it good thus to wait upon God-to begin the new year with prayer as we had ended the old one in praise. On the mor

row I felt thankful to the Lord, on the review of what had happened, and blessed his holy name for the mercies of such a Christmas, for such a conclusion of the old year, and such a commencement of the new, which, when compared to the corresponding seasons passed at Elba and many other places, left no doubt on my mind, whether the path of Christian duty be the path of peace. But here methinks I hear the reader exclaim, "All this is very well for a minister who has nothing else to do, and whose business it is to be thus employed; but such things cannot be expected from others!" To this I answer, that so far as public ministerial duties were concerned in the house of God, the reply is just; but all I have related as done in my own private parlour, might be done by many a master or mistress, by many a naval and military officer, with an equal prospect of good arising from such Christian labours. Nor would this occasional condescension to instruct a few domestics and poor children in the least sink their real dignity, or be acting out of character, in those who profess to believe in Him who preached to all men, as well as to ministers, the whole of what is recorded in the twenty-fifth chapter of St. Matthew's gospel.

David was a warrior, a king in Israel, and not a priest. Yet he was the condescending and instructive companion of all them that feared God, and to such he often said, "Come hither, and I will tell you what the Lord hath done for my soul."

To quit the drawing-room and all its splendour, to leave fashion, elegance, mirth, and beauty behind, and to assemble a little group of dependents and poor children, and converse with them concerning "another and a better world," and the way to obtain it, would indeed expose either master or mistress to the trial of cruel mockings, to no little share of derision and contempt from the sons and daughters of folly and dissipation. But if this be done and continued in a truly Christian spirit, and from Christian motives, it would insure that sentence, "Come, ye blessed children of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for inasmuch as ye have done this thing unto the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."

No. XIII.

WITH A CONCLUDING ADDRESS TO NAVAL

OFFICERS.

"WE BRING OUR YEARS TO AN END AS IT WERE A TALE THAT IS TOLD."-Psalm xc. 9. (old translation.)

HAIL, memorable day, thou kind remembrancer. of past mercies, thou solemn monitor of fleeting time, thou best comment on the above scripture! How soon the alternate seasons of seedtime and harvest, and summer and winter, have measured out another year, and again brought the second of February to greet an unworthy waster of months and of days!

"We know not what a day may bring forth" -emphatic truth, and much more emphatical when applied to months and years! How little throughout the whole of my earthly pilgrimage have I foreseen what succeeding days and months would accomplish! And how much from time to time have they not brought forth, which I neither foresaw nor conceived to be probable! This I can truly say has been the