appear before Him the righteous Judge, and He will reward every one according to his deeds. "Then I turned to the captain and said, But thou poor man, how wilt thou endure it, when all the souls that thou hast sent out of life then come forward and say, 'This villain has deprived us of life just at the time that thou sentest thy messengers to us, and he has prevented our hearing of the means of our salvation?' He remained silent, and looked down. "As I saw that they were all trembling, I continued. Listen to me, and I will give thee counsel how thou mayest escape this fearful judgment; but thou must speedily act on it, for thou art old and must soon die. Fall at the feet of Jesus! Tell him that thou hast heard that he loved mankind so much that he would not cast away any, even the greatest sinners, if they cried to him for pardon. He will have pity even on thee, miserable one, and wash away thy sins in his blood. He promised me, with much emotion, to do so. "When I ceased, Anna, whose brother they had murdered in 1739, went on speaking. She extolled the power of the blood of Jesus, of which she and those around her had experienced the blessedness, and entreated them no longer to resist the truth. Then Sarah Pussimek entered, and she also gave them a long discourse. They all listened with great attention, and were often seen afterwards walking about with hands folded, as if in prayer. TRACT ANECDOTES, FACTS, ETC. TRACTS PROMOTING FAMILY PRAYER. A special effort has this year been made, with great success, to promote the desirable practice of family prayer in the districts under visitation. For this purpose, the missionaries have been supplied with the excellent tract of the RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY, entitled 'Short Prayers for Every Day of the Week,' and 554 families have established the daily worship of God in their households; besides many others, of whose continuance in such a practice the missionaries entertain doubts. Increased blessings from the Hearer and Answerer of prayer will, it is believed, thus descend on 554 families of this great city. Ninth Report; London City Mission. SPEAK GENTLY. BY D. BATES. SPEAK gently!-It is better far Speak gently!-Love doth whisper low Speak gently to the little child! Speak gently to the young, for they Speak gently to the aged one, Grieve not the care-worn heart, The sands of life are nearly run, Speak gently, kindly to the poor, Speak gently to the erring-know, They may have toiled in vain ; Perchance unkindness made them so; O win them back again! Speak gently! He who gave his life To bend man's stubborn will, When elements were in fierce strife, Said to them, "Peace, be still." Speak gently!-'tis a little thing Dropped in the heart's deep well; The good, the joy which it may bring, Eternity shall tell. AMBITION; OR, NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE. To what shall we liken ambition? It is like a ship that proudly spreads her sails to the winds, unmindful of the sunken rocks on which she is afterwards wrecked. It is like a rocket that is one moment high in the air above, and the next deep in the puddle below. "Alas for the rocket ambition!--the higher Ambition is like a balloon, which cannot sustain itself at the height it attains; or, a glittering bubble blown onwards by the winds, and bursting against a tombstone. Hardly does history hold up to the world a more striking example of the vanity of ambition, than the life and death of Napoleon Buonaparte. The rise and fall of the emperor of France is a lesson which ought to benefit mankind. "I have seen," says one, "The ambitious ocean's swell, and rage, and foam, To be exalted with the threatening clouds." And this figure aptly represents the inquietude of an ambitious mind anxiously yearning and striving to climb to objects high above its reach. Well is it for those who can say with truth, "Lord, my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty neither do I exercise myself in great matters, or in things too high for me," Psa. cxxxi. 1. Rapid was the rise of Napoleon, but much more rapid his decline. War was at once his avocation and his delight; and he sought less to preserve, than to destroy. Oh what a MAY, 1847. spreading plague is contention! "War is an idol to which all nations have bowed the knee; his crimson footsteps are impressed on every soil, and millions of self-devoted victims have fallen a sacrifice at his shrine !" When a boy, the favourite plaything of Napoleon was a brass cannon; when at school, he acted as general among his comrades in a fifteen days' mimic battle in the snow; at the age of sixteen he became a lieutenant of artillery. By his military skill he rose to the rank of general, and conquered kingdoms; but ambition still led him on to greater acquisitions; at last the diadem glittered on his brow, and, as an emperor, he wielded the imperial sceptre. Alas! it was through slaughter that he had waded to a throne. It was to attain his own wicked and selfish ends that he had "Shut the gates of mercy on mankind." Reckless of human life, he caused the death of millions; so that when the famous Napoleon pillar was erected to his honour, in the Place Vendôme at Paris, some one wrote upon it an inscription to the following effect: "Tyrant! if the blood which thou hast shed were enclosed within this square, thou mightest drink of it without stooping from thy lofty pillar." Meek-minded follower of the Redeemer, whosoever and wheresoever thou art, if God has given thee strength to labour for the bits and drops necessary to sustain thee, though coarse and scant may be thy food and raiment, receive them with a grateful spirit; for richer, far richer, art thou than a conqueror, and well mayest thou thank the Father of mercies that thy heart is not excited by ambition, nor thy hand stained with blood. Though no earthly crown be thine, yet mayest thou say, through faith in Him who died for thee, "Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day; and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing," 2 Tim. iv. 8. Napoleon once was a powerful conqueror, but he became a powerless captive: he humbled the pride of kings, but he himself was brought down to the dust. Many were his despotic acts, and in Egypt the murder of fourteen hundred of his prisoners placed a black mark upon his brow. Napoleon was skilful and persevering; sometimes he shared the toils and privations of his soldiers; on some few occasions practised humanity and clemency, and exercised moderation over those he vanquished. He abolished the Inquisition; carried on useful public works, and enacted wise laws; but then he was wholly unprincipled and ambitious, and ambition made him vain, haughty, oppressive, and cruel, and led him on to ruin. When Napoleon had invaded Switzerland, Holland and Belgium, Austria, Prussia and Italy, Egypt, Portugal and Spain, Germany and Poland, and made preparations to invade England-when he was at the summit of his power, having in different parts more than a million of soldiers at his command, still unsatisfied, he must needs attempt the conquest of Russia. But though he could fight against man, he could not contend against God. The Lord of hosts discomfited him. "He casteth forth his ice like morsels: who can stand before his cold?" Psa. cxlvii. 17. In all the horrors of the winter season, Napoleon found himself in Russia, without a shelter for his troops, for the Russians had burned Moscow, where he intended to winter. Never was a more disastrous campaign. Panic struck, the great Napoleon fled with precipitation. His army was pursued by the enemy. Thousands fell by the sword, and tens of thousands by the withering cold. The breath of the Almighty consumed them. The mighty Napoleon was now shorn of his strength; the flower of his army was destroyed. In vain he endeavoured to make head against his enemies. Ambition had allured him to his destruction. He was conquered and banished, and though he contrived to escape, and once more to put himself at the head of his army, he was finally overcome, and sent as a captive to the lonely isle of St. Helena, in the South Atlantic ocean, a thousand miles from any other land. Here he passed an unhappy life, and here he died a melancholy death, proclaiming, as it were, aloud, the vanity of ambition, and affording another example to the world that "Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall,” Prov. xvi. 18. The remains of Napoleon are now lying in a grand mausoleum at Paris, unconscious of the honours that have been awarded them. But this grand mausoleum alters not the humiliating fact, that the mighty conqueror Napoleon lived and died on a lonely, rocky isle-an unhappy, and half brokenhearted captive. And was it for this that he added to his crimes and his cruelties? multiplied the number of widows and orphans, oppressed mankind, and made the rivers run' with blood? |