DIALOGUE ON CONFIRMATION.

Ellen and Fanny.

Fanny. Ellen, I am so glad I have met you just now, we can take a turn round the field, and go on talking on the subject we were upon yesterday.

Ellen. I am very glad we have met.

Fanny. When I think that I have indeed been confirmed, I cannot tell you what I feel.

Ellen. Of course you cannot tell me. The gratitude of the soul that is "called and chosen," can be told only to the Saviour who has called and chosen her.

Fanny. When I think that though my dear pious parents dedicated me to Jesus when I was an infant, though they always endeavoured to teach me every thing good, though God has showered such unnumbered mercies on me, giving me health, and food, and clothes, and a happy home, besides giving me the Bible, and his ministers to preach the gospel to me, and more, much more than I can reckon up; yet I loved him not, I contented myself with a form of godliness, I saw no beauty in the Saviour, Christ was not precious to me, and now during the last year, without the smallest merit of my own, He has given me another heart, and made me take such a different view of every thing, "I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth Thee," and when I think I have now been given this opportunity of joining myself to the

Lord, in a perpetual covenant which shall not be forgotten, it seems to myself as if I must be the happiest human being upon earth.

Ellen. Yes, and there is another reflection, dear child, which must solemnize and heighten your gratitude, making you humble while it makes you happy. When you reflect that all this mercy of God to your soul was not an afterthought, if I may so speak-not a mere relenting on the part of God out of compassion to your perishing condition when He saw you walking in darkness, but that long before you were born, even before the foundations of the world were laid, even from all eternity, the salvation of your soul, even yours, was planned in the counsels of the Most High, and your unworthy name was written in heaven; you must feel that while human boasting is for ever excluded, your soul must magnify the Lord, and glory in Him for ever, and for ever.

Fanny, (after a pause.) Ellen, how did you feel when you were confirmed?

Ellen. It was many years ago, dear Fanny-ten years this spring-but I perfectly remember it; I did not feel as you do now, nor indeed like a child of God at all. I felt very little about the matter. I considered it a proper custom like going to church. I thought God would bless me when the Bishop put his hand on me, but I had not one sufficient reason for expecting to be so blest, except a sort of notion that I was trying to be good; in short I was trusting in myself, and not in the blood of Jesus.

Fanny. Oh, Ellen, it does so astonish me that any should trust in themselves for salvation. I think I should hardly care for salvation if it were to be earned: but when I look on it as a gift-a free gift, and say,

'My beautiful heaven is given me by my most dear Saviour, and it cost no less a price than his own blood,' then I feel that salvation is precious indeed.

Ellen. You say that it astonishes you that any one should trust in themselves, but in reality, my dear, it would be much more astonishing if this were not the case. The wonder would be if the natural man did receive the things of the Spirit of God; you know the Scripture says expressly,-the carnal mind receiveth not the things that be of God, for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.

Fanny. But, Ellen, when did you begin to think as you do now?

Ellen. Slowly and gradually I learnt the truth"here a little and there a little." Many sharp afflictions too, helped by God's grace, to bring me home to Him. With some of these you are acquainted; the death of my dear parents, and of my aunt, who felt a mother's love for me, and whom I watched through a long and very painful illness, the loss in a great measure of my own health, these things, and some others quite as distressing, with which you are unacquainted, were greatly blessed to my soul, as I humbly hope and believe. But Satan, as he often does, took advantage of my outward troubles to weaken me inwardly, when he saw me alone in the world, and in heaviness through much sorrow, then he did all he could to keep me from Christ, the only refuge of the afflicted.

Fanny. Ah, yours is indeed a different history from

mine.

Ellen. Yes, my dear child, but it is one which equally magnifies the grace of God. Though, I firmly believe owing to my own fault, I have not had that enjoyment in the ways of religion, which some people

have; yet many an hour of sweet communion with my Saviour, many a peaceful religious hour in the stillness of the night, after a day of care and sorrow, has convinced me that "the yoke is easy." Do you remember that little hymn we were reading together last week— "Beneath thy smile is heavenly bliss, How sweet is solitude with Thee,

My soul in such a world as this,

May yet from anxious cares be free."

Fanny. What was that other hymn you read? pray repeat it again; you said it was such a favourite of yours.

Ellen. "Let me be with thee where thou art,

My Saviour, my eternal rest,

Then only will this longing heart,
Be fully and for ever blest.

Let me be with thee where thou art,
Thy unveiled glory to behold,
Then only will this wandering heart,
Cease to be false to thee and cold.

Let me be with thee where thou art,
Where spotless saints thy name adore,
Then only will this sinful heart,
Be evil and defiled no more.

Let me be with thee where thou art,
Where none can die, where none remove,
There neither life nor death will part

Me from thy presence and thy love."

Fanny. What a sweet prayer is that—" In all time of our tribulation, in all time of our wealth, in the hour of death, and in the day of judgment, good Lord, deliver us.

Ellen. Ah, if he delivers us in tribulation and in wealth, He will deliver us in the hour of death, and in the day of judgment. You are very young at present, and you know not whether in your future life you will be as happily circumstanced as you now are. Also you know not whether it will please God always to turn the sunshine of his countenance upon you. He may hide his face, and then you will be troubled. He may bring you into deep waters, but you need not fear. "All things," yes, my dear child, "all things," joys and sorrows alike; “ALL THINGS work together for good to them that love God, to them that are the called according to his purpose."

Fanny, after a pause. Oh, it makes me so happy to think that I have confirmed my vows myself.—Oh, Ellen, pray that I may keep them faithfully,-to confess Christ crucified-to fight under his banner against "the world, the flesh, and the devil”—oh what a wonderful calling is this, to be united to Christ and to his people.

Ellen. Your feelings, are doubtless like those of Moses when it came into his heart to visit his people. Doubtless, when Moses was born, his pious mother prayed, that if he lived, it might be to serve God. Yet we read that, 'when he was come to years,' he chose the good part voluntarily for himself. "By faith he forsook Egypt, choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season, esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt." I grieve that when I received the Lord's Supper for the first time, my heart was still in the world.-I think the self-dedication of the young convert who receives the emblems of the Saviour's body and blood, with a true faith, must be so