cessary, and beneficial; by the culture of which we shall buy the truth and sell it not. Harlow.

(To be continued.)

THE FIRESIDE.

WHAT a volume of interesting and important associations is comprized in this little word; and how delightfully are its felicities realized in the picture that now presents itself to my eye. A family, variously occupied, assembled round a January fire,-frost and snow without; tranquillity, comfort, enjoyment within. Pass we but the threshold of our quiet dwelling, and sights of misery and scenes of guilt environ us, while round our glowing hearth press warm affections, social blessings, satisfied desires, and grateful aspirations. Books, that furniture without which the most gorgeously decorated apartments have a chilling and desolate air, are on all sides within reach, and among them, prized beyond them all, that book of life and hope which, understood and loved, gives wealth and glory to the hovel, while its absence leaves palaces in gloom and poverty. At the moment in which I write this, the "winter's wind" is whistling drearily among the leafless branches of the mountain ash, that stands before our window, and makes strange contrast with the rustling and crackling of our cheerful fire. Thus situated, thus fenced and sheltered by the providential care of our gracious God, it requires no small effort of watchfulness to guard against a selfish and indolent acquiescence in these blessings, reckless of the transient or the permanent misery, which in various forms, mental, moral, and corporeal, afflicts a world which lies, a dark and withered scene, beneath the curse of sin.

The use of fire is so indispensable to man's necessities, that it has become, as it were, identified with his very existence, the source of a large portion of his enjoyments, the centre of his happiness, the symbol of his domestic and social affections. It is among the strange contrasts of human experience, that the element which destroys, should be the very maintenance of life; that the waster and devourer should

be the nourisher and comforter; that the messenger of wrath and destruction, should be the source of light and glory.

How lightly do we deem of our common and most intimate blessings, though they may be those with which we are least able to dispense. How many a less child of want" and woe, is at this chilling hour shivering beneath an inclement sky,

"house

Faint and despairing of to-morrow's bread!

Youth, manhood, and decrepitude, in multiplied instances, are at this moment, wandering uncertain of a roof to shelter their perturbed rest. In how many forms does misery visit the world! Disease and privation are now afflicting the children of poverty with a keener anguish, while the faint beams of a glimmering candle, and the sickly gleam of a few half-kindled embers, mock their wretchedness with the semblance of alleviation. Bare walls, beds to which the rug on which my dog now stretches his well-warmed limbs, were a couch of luxury, rags for clothing, hunger and debility, these are the actual portion of thousands of my countrymen, while I am blessed with countless comforts, with

those smiling countenances, those loving hearts,-with all that gives peace, and joy, and hope to this happy FIRESIDE.

But, if for these bright providences, I am so deeply indebted to the bounteous Giver of all good gifts; there is yet another view of the same circumstances, in which I have equal, if not higher cause for thankfulness. Look round on the world at large; and, to say nothing of the large mass of average miseries which presses on mankind, reckon up the woes which man, in his wantonness of power or passion, inflicts on man, and add to these the distinct sufferings in which different countries are involved by local or peculiar circumstances. -Large and flourishing cities, with their municipal pomp, and their happy families, have sunk beneath the fiery flood of a volcano, nor have these outlets of the central fire abated their destructive energy. The pestilence that walketh in darkness, has not forgotten its power of desolation; still does it waste kingdoms, still invade the circles of domestic bliss. War with its train of horror passes along distant regions, blighting and destroying, rending from parents, the pride of their youth and the hope of their age, from children, the stay of their infancy and the guide of their advancing years. Bigotry and superstition shed on other realms their blasting and benighting mists, poisoning with their fatal influence the very sources of kindred and social joy. here, a gracious providence preserves us from these dreadful visitations, fences us round with its own safe-guards, arrests the earthquake in its first shudderings, shuts up the floods of fire in the deep bowels of the earth, turns the plague from our shores, preserves our households from the sword of the spoiler, and breaks the chains forged for us by the craft and

But

cruelty of Rome. All these stand aloof, their surges rolled back from our coasts by the protecting arm of God. It would be an endless field of inquiry, were we to descend from these more marked interferences of Almighty power and mercy, to the various modes of social existence throughout the world. Among what kindreds of the nations are personal comforts, and the sacred privacies of domestic life so strongly guarded as among ourselves? It might be an interesting subject of research to ascertain the household manners and enjoyments of the different races of mankind; this is not the place for so extensive a range; but I am well satisfied of this, that from the semi-civilized Iskimo, to the polished nations of Europe, none among them all will be found to have so much reason for gratitude as ourselves. The strongest munitions of Divine Providence guard, and its choicest blessings crown,-the ENGLISHMAN'S FIRE

SIDE.

This is not all. If I have such reason to bless God that he has given me these things richly to enjoy, and that he has cast my lot in a country where they are possessed in the greatest reality and security, I have yet a higher theme of praise, in that he has shown me how and in what spirit they are to be best enjoyed. God can send a curse to wither our blessings; even blessings themselves cease to be so, when unholily or ungratefully received. How many are there who revel amid the gifts, heedless of the gracious Giver! How many who convert the bounteous dispensations of heaven into the unhallowed sources of dissipation, intemperance, and forgetfulness of God. And of those whose portion in this world is want and wretchedness, how are the afflictions aggravated by their moral destitution; how miserable is it to encounter at once

the sufferings of the flesh, and the bitterness of a murmuring spirit. Why is it otherwise with me? How have I deserved an exemption from this severe allotment?— Deserved-Alas! If my deservings were the measure of the Divine mercies,-reft of the humble but substantial comforts of this stormproof habitation-torn from the dear domestic blessings which smile around me-swept from the very surface of God's glorious creation-deprived even of the last refuge of the wretch, hope,-I should envy the lowest and most desperate of this world's outcasts. Blessed be His name who has borne the miseries of his people, and blotted out the hand-writing of condemnation against them! Blessed be the liberal and unupbraiding Giver of all our blessings, from the hope of everlasting glory, to the peaceful enjoyments of a happy family! Praise be to Him who gives and guards the "sacred and homefelt delight," which gives its most genial glow to the Englishman's hearth. And, above all, our heartfelt and eternal gratitude is due to the Dispenser of all these mercies, for the rich graces, the lovely charities, and the bright prospects that hallow and make joyful the CHRISTIAN'S FIRESIDE!

KHAIBR (Jews whom NIEBUHR mentions in his travels,) as their brethren! They replied, "God forbid for those never came to Jerusalem; they remained in the desert when JOSHUA brought the rest of the people of God into the land of promise; and thus they live there in the desert near Mecca, without any knowledge of the law or the Prophets, wandering about as robbers and enemies of mankind. They call themselves the Beni MOSHE, (children of Moses.)"

In a subsequent conversation with Rabbi MOSE SECOT, the subject is thus renewed:- "I have heard of Jews (in Niebuhr's Travels) who are wandering about like Arabs, near Mecca: do you know of them?

"Rabbi Moses Secot.-They are called the Beni KHAIBR.'

"I was rejoiced to perceive that they are known by the Jews at Jerusalem, under the very name which NIEBUHR gave to them; and I asked Rabbi Mose SecotDid some of those Beni Khaibr ever come to Jerusalem ?

"Rabbi Mose Secot.-Yes,in the time of Jeremiah the Prophet."How do you know this?"

"Rabbi-Let us read the Prophet Jeremiah.--He then read Jeremiah xxxv. 1—11. You see by it that the Rabbi is quite certain that the Beni Khaibr are descendants of the Rechabites: they drink at this present moment no wine, and have neither vineyard, nor field, nor seed, but dwell, like Arabs, in tents, and are wandering Nomades; they believe and observe the laws of Moses by tradition, for they are not in possession of the written law: and Moses Secot observed, that their name, Khaibr, is to be found in Judges iv. 11. "Now Khcibr, (the same. a's Heber,) the Kenite, which was of the children of Hobab, the fatherin-law of Moses, had severed him-' self from the Kenites, and pitched his tent in the plain of Zaanaim,

which is by Kedesh." And it was among the Beni Khaibr where Sisera found his death, (Judges iv. 19.) and of whom Deborah sang, "Blessed above women shall Jael, the wife of Heber (Khaibr) the Kenite, be, blessed shall she be above women in the tent ;" and those Beni Khaibr are descendants of Jethro, the fatherin-law of Moses; and Mose Secot proved it by Numbers x. 29."

This account by Mr. Wolfe, will, I trust, turn the attention of Christian travellers to a people whom the prophecy of Jeremiah has made so interesting. Even from the information already received respecting them, there is little doubt, but that in the existence, to the present day, of this tribe of Nomade Jews, the prediction has received an accomplishment, as wonderful as the preservation of the descendants of Ishmael. Jonadab, the son of Rechub, notwithstanding the lapse of ages, and the successive overthrow of states and empires, confounding all their names, and changing all their customs, "wants not a man to stand before the Lord," and the traveller may still find repose in the tent of "HEBER, the Kenite," from the exhaustion of a desert-journey, ASTROP.

་་་་་་་་

SOCINIAN INTERPOLATION

DETECTED.

(To the Editors.)

To the generality of your readers, it is no doubt well known, that the tenets of the Greek church are as strictly Trinitarian as those of the church of Rome. It is also, most probably, known to the majority, that a beautiful selection of poetry from Russian authors, entitled the "Russian Anthology," has been elegantly translated into English by Mr. John Bowring, (for which, it is said, he has received the thanks of the Emperor Alexander, accompanied by a present of a valuable ring.)

Some months since, a sublime "Hymn to the Deity" was pointed out to me in a Socinian monthly publication, as being taken from the work above mentioned; greatly admiring it, I transcribed it. I was surprized that it appeared so consonant to the Unitarian system, yet little suspected that any person or persons would dare to alter the work of any author to suit their own peculiar religious sentiments; yet such is the fact, for being shortly after on a visit, where I met with the second edition of Mr. Bowring's work, and, taking it up to read that hymn to a friend, I was immediately struck with astonishment, by finding that the lines stood thus:

"O thou Eternal One, whose presence

bright

All space doth occupy, all motion guide : Unchanged through Time's all-devastating flight;

Thou only God! There is no God beside! Being above all beings! Three in One!”

Whereas, in the publication first alluded to, the three last words in

the last line of the five above

quoted are rendered—“ Almighty

One!"

I have been urged to make the circumstance public, by those and whose opinions I esteem; leave all comments to such as value truth and honour.

VERITAS.

ON MODERN POPISH MIRACLES.

(To the Editors.)

YOUR Correspondent "Antidolus," (see Cong. Mag. for Oct. last,) gives us an extract from Milner's work, and an account of the miracles performed by the hand of F. Arrowsmith; it is true that the touch of a dead hand has been extolled for the cure of indolent tumours, or scrophulous swellings, when that hand had not belonged to a saint; and may be found in our older Pharmacopoeias. Be this as it may, it is evident that the

virtue of Arrowsmith's hand is not supposed to be physical, but religious, and is made use of as proof of the wonder-working power of the Church of Rome and her priests. Had this deception been practised only in Lancashire, you should not have heard from me on the subject; but there are other parts where the same lying wonders are made subservient to the same end. The people allow these things to pass on, and even in many places the belief is almost universal, that the priests have supernatural powers and can heal the sick. It may happen, sometimes, that the force of imagination, or the crisis of the disease, favours the deceiver, and then the deluded multitude cry out, a miracle."

I spent a part of my early life in the most popish district of the Lowlands of Scotland. I have seen the persons who have been converted to popery by these pretended miracles, and I can assure Antidolus, that the facts which he brings to view, are deserving the attention of every consistent Protestant. I knew some of the members of a family, who were brought within the pale of the Church of Rome, by a pretended miracle wrought on the father when he was sick; the particulars I cannot relate, as I was at that time too young to investigate I remember also having seen a woman, who was subject to temporary fits of mental derangement; she had been taken to the priest, but his exertions had failed, and, in the paroxysms, she went about through the country, sprinkling every family with water, and muttering some unintelligible gibberish, in imitation of the treatment she had been subjected to herself.

them.

The increase of popery can never go on by argument; it is an irrational system; but the imagination is set to work, and proCONG. MAG. No. 62.

duces great effects. These miracles may seem contemptible to a man of erudition or science; but an artful practitioner, and an ignorant multitude, meet at vast odds, and it is not a few who are, at this day, thus deceived. While we pray for the coming of Christ's kingdom, while we send Bibles and Missionaries to other lands, are we not guilty, if we allow the enemy to sow tares in our own. ANTIPAPA.

P. S. Since writing the above, I have seen a letter in the Philanthropic Gazette, from William Talbot, Esq., of Castle Talbot, in the county of Wexford, in support of the miracles of Prince Alexander Hohenlohe, who now turns out to be a clergyman of the Church of Rome, and works miracles for her support!

ELEGANCIES OF MODERN
IDIOMS.

O Curve in terris Animæ.
PERS. SAT.

I WONDER, Mr. Editor, that so few of your right learned and able correspondents have practically regarded the observations some time ago offered by Curtius on Brevity. I thank him for his hints, and have so far profited by them that, instead of sending you a grave disquisition, illustrative of the beauty of modern improvements in the style and idiom of the English language, I have resolved, at present, only to let you see a scrap or two which I deposited the other day in my pocket-book. I intend, however, to continue these notes whenever new fashions in language meet my observation; and if any of your travelling correspondents can tell us from what country they have been imported, they will, doubtless, oblige and amuse your readers.

"You are requested to take a FAMILY DINNER with an individual M