in his holy calling. And are these lessons nothing worth to one who has also to pass through many sufferings? They are of unspeakable value; and my aim shall be to improve such an example, how little soever I may attain; and I will look for the same Divine Helper that he had."

"August, 15, 1810.-A day ever to be remembered! when the imprisoned spirit of my honoured minister, and father in the gospel, was released from its painful and humiliating captivity, and winged its way to the land of liberty and rest! In past time, there was scarcely any event at which I could so little bear to look, as his death. But such an inroad, and havoc, had disease made on this extraordinary man, that I even longed for his release before it took place; and when the tidings reached me, a sad and solemn gladness overspread my mind; I could only contemplate the amazing change from pain, weakness, and depression, to glory unspeakable and never ending!

"A few more suffering days for myself, and then, I trust, his own words written to me in a letter will be verified: 'to-morrow morning, you and I shall walk in a garden where I shall hope to speak to you about every thing but sadness.'

T

"He is gone! and take his character in the whole combination of it, and in its circumference, he surely has not left his like. He is gone! unknown, but to those who lived with him in the same house. I had that privilege for many years. I have had the favour to attend him in his sick chamber,-in his family retirements, and in his most confidential habits;-in those unbended easy moments, when some, even great ones, have appeared little, and common :-but when he appeared most superior.

"It has been said, he was austere ;and before I knew him intimately, I thought so too;-but it was only because he was not known. He was sometimes

austere in like manner as truth is aus

tere, for he was a lover of truth. If there was any one virtue he prized more

than another, it was integrity,—a high and honourable principle; and he would mark the smallest deviation from it in a moment. Severity might sometimes sit on his brow-dart in his eye--and carry the sound of it in his decided manner of speech but it never for a moment lodged in his heart,-which was too noble, too benevolent, too affectionate, to be the seat of any thing so unlovely as severity. And whenever he bore the aspect, it arose from the prevailing abstraction of his mind, which was always intensely pursuing rigid subjects,-and from his most uncommon energy and decision of character. But his friendly and benevolent sympathies were awakened in the moment they were called for. His heart, and his ear, were quick to the cry of every sufferer, whether high or low. He was, like his Divine Master, peculiarly the friend of the friendless,— the comforter of the afflicted,-the gentle instructor of the ignorant. The rich he never sought; the poor he never neglected or shunned. But words would fail me; his worth can never be known. No matter;-he had, and so should I have, higher views than the honour which cometh from man,-even the honour which cometh from God. May every one of his children, and myself (who was unto him as a daughter,) be careful to transplant his virtues and graces into our hearts and lives. We shall go to him, but he shall not return to us!

We have not space left for any extracts from Mrs. Hawkes's notes of Mr. Cecil's sermons. His style of preaching was original and striking; acutely scrutinizing, richly embodied with evangelical statements, and bearing pointedly upon the experience of the Christian, and these specimens are a very valuable addition to the volume.

lege of personal acquaintance with many British and Continental Christians in various stations of Society, whose character and conduct have commanded my respect, conciliated my affection, stimulated my zeal, laid me low in the

dust of self-abasement, and filled my mind with praise and thanksgiving to God on their behalf; but I have met with but few, who, during an intercourse of more than 30 years, left a deeper impression on my mind of the powerful influence of true religion upon the spirit, temper, walk, and conversation of the sincere Christian, than did my late departed friend. A man in understanding, a child in simplicity- he was a Nathanael in whom was no guile. And yet he remained no stranger to what was passing in the world; he was a close observer of men and things; attentively, and, with much penetration of human character, watching and discerning the signs of the times. He combined firmness of purpose with meekness of spirit and gentleness of disposition. Possessed of solid erudition, his single aim and endeavour was to consecrate all his talents to the glory of God, and to the good of his fellow creatures. From early youth he was disciplined in the school of affliction, which led him to much prayer and searching theScriptures. Christ became increasingly his all and in all his wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption! The love of Christ constrained him, and his heart overflowed with love to his Christian brethren of every name, denomination, and nation, and to mankind at large. His labours for the cause and kingdom of his divine Master, and the salvation of immortal souls, were abundant. He felt the deepest interest in the conversion of the benighted heathen. For upwards of 20 years he acted as secretary of the German Missionary Society at Bàsle, and as tutor of the Missionary college in that city. The Lord was pleased to command a signal blessing upon his laborious and well-directed exertions. He trained neary 150 young men in the college, for their sacred work, who honoured him as a tutor, and loved him as a father; many of whom have proved eminently useful in the different portions which they were called upon to occupy in various parts of the Mahometan and Heathen world. He maintained a friendly intercourse with many of the active Missionary societies in Great Britain, and on the continents of Europe and America; but was more immediately connected with the Church Missionary Society in London, in the important labours of which he took the most lively interest, and to whose committees and officers he furnished not a few most active and useful labourers. He published a quarterly magazine, in which he took a connected view of the Missionary operations carrying on in our days in diffe.

rent parts of the globe; a work which essentially contributed to cherish and increase that Missionary spirit which has of late years been kindled.

I am, Reverend and dear Sir, yours with the sincerest esteem and Christian affection,

C. T. A. STEINKOPFF.

Extract of a Letter from the Rev. A. Ostertag, one of the tutors of the Missionary College at Bâsle.

"Dec. 27th, 1838.

"It is with a bleeding heart that I take up the pen to inform you of the most painful loss which our Missionary Society has sustained by the death of my dear, invaluable uncle, the Rev. Mr. Blumhardt. I can scarcely think it as yet a reality, all appears to me still like a distressing dream. Our loss is incalculably great. One consideration only supports and cheers me that the Lord liveth, the very same Lord who is called, Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God; the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.'

"Allow me to communicate to you some particulars connected with his last illness and death. When I reached Bâsle on the 29th of October last, on my return from a journey to England, I perceived, at the very first sight of him, such a decay of his earthly tabernacle, that I was filled with uneasiness and apprehension. Having received from me a full report of my proceedings in London, he introduced me to the Bâsle Missionary Committees, and also favoured me with his advice how I might best conduct myself in that department of labour which had been assigned to me. On Saturday, Nov. 3rd, I found him very weak in body, but calm and serene in his mind; and in conversing with me, he seemed quite to revive. But in the night, from Saturday to Sunday, he was seized with repeated attacks of spasms in the stomach and in the chest, which reached at length such a degree of violence, that they threatened immediate death. The conflict of nature was most severe; his pains were excessive, his cries to the Lord strong and urgent. The physicians declared his case hopeless; he himself prepared for immediate departure-took a most affecting leave of his wife and his only daughter, assured them of his unalterable love and attachment, and implored the especial protection and blessing of God upon them. The only wish he expressed, was, that if it was consistent with the will of his Heavenly Father, he might favour him with one more easy and quiet hour, in

order that he might thereby be enabled to converse on some important points with his intimate friend, Mr. Spittler. I then hastened to the Missionary students, entreating them to unite in prayer for the preservation of his life, or that at least the desired hour of ease might be granted to him. They immediately offered up their united and fervent prayers; indeed all in the Missionary House, and many Christian friends in the city, wrestled with God in supplication on his behalf. At 9 o'clock in the evening the violence of the attack ceased he quietly fell asleep, and slept till the next morning. We now were filled with adoring gratitude and praise. The amendment was great and rapid; he could again leave his bed-staid up for 4 to 6 hours, was all serenity and peace, and indulged the pleasing hope, that the ensuing Spring might, under the blessing of God, complete his recovery. But the all-wise Disposer of events was pleased to ordain it differently. A relapse came on, a fortnight after, of a most violent nature, which completely exhausted his remaining strength. Though suffering most acutely from bodily pain and oppression, his understanding remained clear, his mind tranquil, his soul cheerful and perfectly resigned to the will of God. Even after this relapse, some intervals of ease occurred, which somewhat revived our sinking hopes. But in the night, from the 17th to the 18th, his weakness increased to such an alarming degree, that he sent for a friend, and communicated to him his wishes relative to several arrangements to be made both previous to and after his departure. At seven in the morning I came to him. I feel myself,' he said, 'a dying man; but as to the great concerns of the salvation of my soul-all is in order. I am cleansed by the blood of the atonement. To me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.' He then desired me to request his physicians that they might in his presence candidly communicate to him their view of his state. They plainly intimated that his debilitated frame could not sustain much longer the repeated attacks

of the disease, and that he was fast approaching to his heavenly home. When afterwards I spent a little time with him alone, he communicated to me several points of importance, which I noted down. On the evening which preceded his death, he requested to be placed into his arm-chair. Here he entered in friendly conversation into the nature and progress of his disorder, interspersing words of consolation, and adding, in a tone of cheerfulness, 'Surely there will not be wanting for me a blessed employment in the kingdom of Heaven, of a kindred nature to that which I have been privileged to carry on here below. Surely we, my Christian brethren, remain united in one great and glorious cause, in a holy and blessed communion with the Father of spirits, and with His Son, Jesus Christ.'

When I was called again to him on the morning of the 19th December, all the symptoms of approaching dissolution had made their appearance. He could now pronounce only short, broken sentences, such as these:-'Peace-Glory

Lord take me to thyself!-Christ is my life-Soon I shall have overcome by the blood of the Lamb l'

"We then, in compliance with a wish previously expressed, admitted to his chamber ten of the Missionary stuIdents, who, in a soft, subdued tone, sung a few beautiful verses expressive of his wish to depart, and be with Christ. Shortly before he expired, he exclaimed, with a brightening countenance, Light breaks in! Hallelujah!'

"On Saturday, Dec. 22, we accompanied his earthly remains to their resting place. The Rev. Mr. Larosche (Rector of St. Peter's parish) preached the funeral sermon from a text selected by the departed himself: Our friend Lazarus sleepeth.' The Missionary brethren sung a few verses in a most solemn and affecting manner; and the Missionary Zaremba as representative of the many Missionaries whom the departed had prepared for their sacred work-offered up a prayer over the grave."

It is important in itself; for assuredly there must be something grievously wrong in the condition of a country professing to be civilized and Christian, in which not only are the rights of property publicly trampled upon, as in the opprobrious instance of the conspiracy

66

against the Church revenues, but human life itself is set at nought with a bloodthirsty recklessness which would disgrace a horde of savages. There is nothing in all Europe that matches the profligate and lawless state of some parts of Ireland. Tipperary, if we may believe Judge Moore, is a shamefully maligned country; it is not, he said, the strong-hold of crime, as it boasts to be of popery; the refuge of culprits as well as of saints; it is not an alarmed world;" but it has " an excellent population," and "a noble gentry, who hold fine places, and can live comfortably and happily in them.' And yet in this Goshen, this papal paradise, the committals in 1837 for homicide were 124; exceeding by 13 the number in the ten northern Protestant counties of Ireland, and forming a list of crime against human life which, if perpetuated on the same scale in England, would require new cells to contain the murderers, and additional judges to try them. As many as eighty persons were actually arraigned at the Spring Assizes last year in Tipperary for murder, or abetting murder; but the jurors, who if they did what they were sworn to do, were in greater danger than the murderers, acquitted every one of these eighty persons; whether from the effect of Judge Moore's speech; or from the banded peasants and priests having suppressed the necessary evidences; or from whatever other causes, they best know; but such was the fact. And lately, as a comment on the learned judge's harangue, the Queen, through her vicegerent, who had himself despoiled so many prisons of their tenants, was obliged to appoint a special commission, and a few convictions were happily effected; but the vast mass of crime was scarcely touched. Take a single fact. One of our correspondents alludes to a pious lady in that county, whose father, whose brother-in-law, whose cousin, the pastor of whose parish, as well as the pastor of the next parish, were all murdered; and whose husband and brother were fired at with intent to murder; as were the pastors of two adjoining parishes. These murders, and attempts at murder, were at different times, for different causes, and imply an awful aggregate of floating criminality. Of three guests who were visiting in a holy and a happy family, two of them, Mr. Whitty and Mr. Cooper, were murdered; and it has been stated to us, that there is scarcely a respectable family in the county that has not lost some relative, friend, neighbour, or connexion, by assassination. These are casual illustrations.

Assuredly, then, it was right to exa

mine into the causes of such a state of things; for though there have been numerous committees upon all sorts of Irish affairs, and without much useful result, here is a case which imperiously demands investigation; and the inquiry, if it go to the root of the evil, will shew that Popery is in various ways, and particularly by prohibiting the reading of the word of God by the people, the prime instigator of the crimes which desolate Ireland. Robbers and assassins do not generally pretend to any religion, unless they are Papists; but if Papists, they go to mass and confession, and expect priestly absolution to blot out the foulest crimes. A Protestant may make a shew of religion to conceal his crimes; but he does not think himself religious; whereas, in these Irish affairs, we constantly meet with such declarations as the following: "I was going," says one of the witnesses at the Tipperary trials, "to the chapel at eleven o'clock. Three of us took a half-gallon of beer that morning; and we had hardly had the last tumbler when we went to mass." These men were not hypocrites; they did not go to the chapel for a pretence; both parts of their conduct were, in their opinion, coherent; nor is it doubtful that hundreds and thousands of miscreants, whose hands were stained with blood, have received absolution.

But the proposed inquiry is more particularly connected with the system upon which her Majesty's advisers have governed Ireland, in regard, especially, to the encouragement thereby given to crime. It is always painful to Christian men to speak otherwise than with respect of those who are placed in stations of rule and authority; but their reverence for " the powers that be," is not to make them palliate what they believe to be opposed to the will of God. Dr. Chalmers described this case very Scripturally in the following passage in his sermon on the death of the Princess Charlotte, which we quote, rather than any recent statement, and instead of expressing the matter in our own words, in order to shew that it is not an opinion set forth for an occasion. He says:

"There is only one case in which it is conceived that the partizanship of a Christian minister is at all justifiable. Should the government of our country ever fall into the hands of an infidel or demi-infidel administration-should the men at the helm of affairs be the patrons of all that is unchristian in the sentiments and literature of the countryshould they offer violence to its religious establishments, and thus attempt what we honestly believe would reach a blow to the piety and the character of our

population-then, I trust, that the language of partizanship will resound from many of the pulpits of the land, and that it will be turned in one stream of pointed invective against such a ministry as this; till by the force of public opinion it be swept away as an intolerable nuisance from the face of our kingdom.'

Now, believing, as we do, that this condition of things has long since arrived, in regard to the proceedings of the Melbourne cabinet, we should think it a national blessing, if the success of Lord Roden's motion should lead to its resignation, which Lord John Russell has pledged himself that it will, unless the House of Commons should proffer a counteracting vote of confidence. This vote may probably be obtained, by a small majority; but it will not express the general sentiment of the nation. We pass by the opposition of mere political Toryism and Radicalism; and we will refer only to that portion of public disapprobation which is distinctly connected with the case specified by Dr. Chalmers. We do not think that Lord Melbourne has duly consulted the moral and spiritual interests of the commonweal, and the prosperity of the established churches of the land. The items of proof are too numerous for recital; but looking to the church-rate question in England; the church-extension in Scotland; the tithe-appropriation question, and several others in Ireland; the appointment of Lord Ebrington (now Fortescue) to the viceroyalty of Ireland, after his declaration that the Protestant Church in that island is "a stain, a disgrace, and a misfortune to the country;" the efforts to establish, both in England, and other parts of her Majesty's dominions, a national system of education, of which religion is not the basis and pervading element; the favour shewn to Popery in the colonies, by grants for the support of bishops and missionaries, while those for Protestant missions have been suppressed; we see the general spirit of their policy, or rather impolicy; and we do not believe that the blessing of God will be vouchsafed to the land under such a system.

There is another particular which we feel constrained to add to the above; namely, the aspect which the circle that surrounds the throne is assuming under the auspices of Lord Melbourne. An amiable and well-educated Queen was thrown at a very tender age very much under the advice and influence of her chief minister; and on him it may be presumed, in a great measure, depended whether the precincts of royalty should be a temple of wisdom, decorum, and

Has

piety; or whether they should be characterised by enervating frivolities, which, even were religious considerations overlooked, are peculiarly distasteful to the English nation. this solemn responsibility been well weighed and acted upon? Can we believe that it has, when we remember the recent appointment of a nobleman, judicially convicted of the grossest wickedness, to a station of immediate attendance upon our youthful sovereign; and this, moreover, after the warning conveyed by the universal disgust expressed in the appointment of Mr. Wakefield and Mr. Turton to ordinary civil offices? Nor is it pleasing to the nation to see announced day after day the attendance of the royal circle at the theatre and opera-house; for even those who do not shun the stage from its ungodly character, yet perceive that habits of play-going are not desirable, when the mind is to be kept in frame for the serious business and severe duties of life. We may be attributing too much to the character and influence of a prime minister in matters not official; but a young Queen might probably be led, according to the advice offered, either to regard the theatre as a place where her subjects rejoiced to hail her, and which she must in duty frequent, even if it were distasteful to her; or as a scene of fascination, an absorbing taste for which was to be avoided, even if an occasional indulgence were not considered unwarrantable. We sincerely believe that her Majesty is taught to consider that she is acting wisely, amiably, and patriotically in encouraging the drama, and presenting herself before the play-frequenting portion of her subjects; but can any seriously-reflecting person read such paragraphs as the following in the newspapers without pain?" Under her Majesty's enlightened patronage the stage is every where becoming more popular and national." "Her Majesty has visited the opera and theatres nearly a dozen times within a few weeks." "Her Majesty has twice within one week visited Drury-lane theatre to see the lions and Jack Frost, with which she was highly entertained." "Her Majesty's theatre: Lablache altogether entered into his part, here and there introducing a scrap of English, which never failed to provoke roars of laughter; and the naïve manner in which he shouted out D-n Mr. Brook,' after embracing Ford for his wife, was irresistible." We do not know that her Majesty was present on this particular occasion: but almost every acted play exhibits much that ought not to