DR. BEARD'S EDUCATIONAL MANUALS. ELF-CULTURE; a practical answer to the questions "What to Learn," "How to Learn," "When to Learn," with illustrative anecdotes, &c., &c. : forming a coniplete Guide to Self-Instruction. Price 1s. 6d., red cloth, gilt, N EASY INTRODUCTION TO THE ART OF LETTER WRITING; com. Aprising, together with a series of original models, Instructions in English Grammar and Composition. T Price 2s., cloth, HE RATIONAL PRIMER, or FIRST READER. A Practical Answer to the Question, How can I Learn to Read? On a New, Simple, and Easy Methed, combining Attractiveness with Useful Instruction, and forming a Storehouse of Popular Wisdom. THE HE MANCHESTER AND LIVERPOOL SPELLING BOOK, on a New Plan, with complete Lists of Prefixes, Affixes, Arithmetical Tables, &c., &c:Fourth Edition, Revised and Improved, by R. ASHMAN. London: WHITTAKER & Co., and SIMPKIN, MARSHALL & Co Now Ready, Price One Shilling, Fourth Edition of DAILY TALK IN FRENCH AND ENGLISH, à l'usage des écoles et des familles; by A. C. G. JOBERT, author of The Art of Questioning and Answering in French-The Philosophy of Geology'-' Ideas; or Outlines of a New System of Philosophy'-' Pure Sounds'-etc., etc. MANCHESTER: John Heywood. LONDON: Simpkin, Marshall, & Co.; and Whittaker & Co., Ave Maria Lane. Price 2s. 6d. EARLY DAYS, BY SAMUEL BAMFORD, Second Edition. Revised and Corrected by the Author. Price One Penny, Tenth Thousand, SERMON IN WORDS OF ONE BY A MANCHESTER LAYMAN. SYLLABLE, Price 6d., 126 pp., bound in cloth, New Issue of Rev. E. D. JACKSON'S Edition of LINDLEY MURRAY'S ENGLISH GRAMMAR.-This Edition contains 1. Lindley Murray's Text.-2. Copious Notes.-3. Exercises in all the Parts of Speech, and Rules of Syntax, Prosody, Punctuation, &c.-4. Exercises in English Composition.-5. Questions and Answers in connection with every portion of the Work London: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, & Co. Now ready, price 2s., elegantly bound, THE AMATEUR Cheetham Hiv, near Manchester, late Editor of the Floricultural Review. This work comprises copious instructions and directions as to the cultivation of the following florist's flowers: the polyanthus, auricula, hyacinth, pansy, pelargonium, tulip, roses, pinks, carnations, dahlias, verbenas, &c., &c.; and also containing lists of the best out of each variety, by which means the amateur will be enabled to purchase only such as are worthy of a place in the most choice selections. “Your's Faithfully.” MY DEAR FRIENDS, Y last "letter to the Men of Manchester" was MTM not received with the greatest degree of favour, and the replies it evoked were the reverse of complimentary. The reason of this reception was that, in that letter I ventured to state what I honestly believed, and what I believe still, without that prudent reserve which waits to ascertain how the sentiments expressed are likely to " go down" with the general public. If a similar honesty is likely to produce a like result again, I cannot hope for any better reception to be accorded to the letter which I now indite; for it is not my intention to try to purchase good words or bid for any flattering encomiums by hiding what I think. "Let bygones be bygones" is a phrase often used by those who are fond of talking about charity and mutual forbearance, and so on. It may be a very good maxim with certain limitations, and with those limitations I willingly accept it. when we are contemplating a temporary farewell, it is not un natural that we should desire to revive some of the memories of the past. The maxim I have quoted would be anything but a desirable one if it were suffered to close up all the pleasant avenues of retrospect through which the mind delights sometimes to stroll. I can only say that, to myself at all events, the rehearsal of some of the remembrances of our mutual acquaintance during the last eighteen weeks will be fraught with pleasure, and I am bold enough to entertain the hope that there are at least some who will in some degree share that pleasure as we look back. Well! what have we done after all our meetings for these four months? There are many ready to say, "echo answers, what?" Others there are who would take the office of echo on themselves and say, 'What have you done? Why, you have continued to cram the Free Trade Hall every Sunday afternoon by desecrating the Sabbath, by cajoling people to congregate together, through the medium of slang, and by the aid of clap-trap titles to clap-trap speeches. You have tried to insinuate yourself into the good graces of the working population of the town, by pandering to their lowest tastes and by hashing up morsels of morality and religion amongst a lot of gravy and sauce from Billingsgate, and a quantity of rant from Bedlam. You have tried to gain credit for sincerity by mere blatant and loud professions; and have systematically burlesqued the attribute of Christian charity by avowing yourself the friend and the apologist of the outcast and the vile. What have you done? You have advertised our publichouses by pretended denunciations of them; you have increased drunkenness by preaching moderation; you have drawn down new blows on the defenceless by the clumsy chivalry with which you have affected to defend them. You have drawn upon yourself the disgust of all well-regulated minds, by the coarseness of your ideal exposures of imaginary foibles. And you have merited the just indignation of your brethren in the ministry by the untrue allusions you have made to them, and the manner in which you have contaminated their superior doeskin by rubbing it against inferior fustian." Such is the flattering resumé which a number of commentators wavering between their desire to appear in print, and their fear lest it shouldn't pay, are ready at any moment to take of our proceedings in this hall on Sunday afternoons. Let us hope it is not a correct one. It is difficult to speak of actual results without appearing to be egotistical. I hope, however, to be able to say a word or two on this head, before I close, without being charged with great immodesty. In the meantime let me say a little as to our intentions and aims. If you had believed that the description I have given above was anything like a true one, you would scarcely have continued to attend here Sabbath after Sabbath as you have done. Let me, therefore, hope that there are not a few who will give me credit for being in earnest in my own account of my intentions. Instead of desiring to desecrate the Sabbath, I have been most anxious to preserve it from desecration. Tens of thousands in this city never approach our houses of worship; never join their voices in singing the praises of God's house; never hear the sound of prayer, or litany, or hymn; never listen to the words of love as breathed in the appeals of sermons, but look at a sanctuary with disdain, and spurn its services with scorn. It is not to desecrate the Sabbath that I have laboured here, but to make the churchgoing bell more musical in men's ears, and the cross which surmounts its pinnacles more attractive in their eyes. If any man has been driven away from worship by these addresses, it has not been because of an intentional design, but because of the very importunity with which he has been invited to observe it. Slang, too! I don't deny that slang has sometimes been employed, but it has been only as an occasional auxiliary, and not as a regularly adopted medium. That element was used much more profusely at the outset of my lecturing endeavours than it is now, and it has been gradually and consistently modified. and toned down. Whatever may be thought of the thing The itself, the motive was a conscientious and a good one. slang was used merely on the same principle as the church bell is used, to call together those who would be too sleepy to come together without it. But instead of dishing up morsels of the gospel with a profuse infusion of slang, I have only tried to dish up a little slang with a profuse infusion of the gospel. I want thoughtful people, who really object to certain elements of my procedure here, to distinguish between humour and slang. There is a wide difference between them. The one puts ideas (often good, useful, and moral in themselves) merely in a grotesque light, while the other adopts the very phraseology of the vulgar and unrefined. It is not very often that I have been guilty of this latter fault. These addresses have been as severely and minutely criticised as though they had been prepared to be delivered before some learned body of "potent, grave, and reverend signors," instead of to "plain, blunt men," fresh-washed from the anvil, or scarce cooled from the mill. Then too they have heen most unjustly spoken of as "sermons," and dealt with as though they had been delivered from the pulpit. Now this is a most ungenerous slander. I know these lectures contain much which I should deem it profanation to preach from a pulpit; but I do not regard it out of place to enforce secular lessons of useful reform from a secular platform, by the agency of a humour, and a latitude of illustration which should be excluded from the stated pulpit ministry. I wrote an introduction to my first volume of addresses, in which I stated as clearly as I could what were and what were not my objects. I never designed them as models of taste. I never wished them to lie on drawing room tables. I wanted them to find their way to rugged hearts. I wanted them to be read in garrets, to be spelt out by the dim light which streamed through cellar door, or by the struggling ray of the poor man's dip candle. I wanted them to be thumbed by the grimy hand of the workman in his cottage, and not by the taper fingers of the fair in the mansion. I wanted them to cheer the leisure hour of the poor and dejected, |