Near her a mingled heap I mark
Of faggots, racks, and chains;
But there the light falls faint and dark,
And shrouding veil remains :
Ofttimes, 'mid her familiar friends,
Her eye that way the harlot bends
With dark and devilish smile;
Yet when a stranger's glance is cast,
Like misty dream unbas'd, long past,
Appears that fearful pile.

She sits not still in idle state;
She rides upon her beast,

While thousands at her bidding wait

To do each high behest.
We see her working in the land;
Temples arise at her command,

In idol-splendour dight;

She's in the senate, near the throne,
In seats of learning is she known-
We shudder at the sight.

We see her take God's holy book
With firm, determin'd grasp,

And swear that none therein shall look,
And none the seals unclasp.
With rapid pen, with steady eye,
Changing God's truth into a lie,

She takes the teacher's seat;

While famish'd babes, that pine for bread, With her vile stones are chok'd, not fed, And perish at her feet,

It is no dream-'tis true-'tis true-
I would it were a dream!
The facts are glaring in our view;
But truths like falsehoods seem.
A puny crippled dwarf we thought
Safely from prison might be brought;
And in an evil hour

Her limbs we chafed-her chains we broke,
And pitying words of kindness spoke ;
-She sprung to giant-power.

Ay-and the chain her limbs that bound
She grasps with despot-hand;

Upon the souls of men 'tis found,
It glides around the land:

Force, movement, vigour in her glow-
Her might-our sin too late we know,
And lift our eye to Heaven:

O, for a firm, united cry,

From all our land to God most high,

That we may be forgiven!

THE PATRIOT'S ARMS.

(For the Protestant Magazine.)

"We made our prayer unto our God, and set a watch against them day and night because of them."-NEHEMIAH iv. 9.

As Salem's walls from ruin rose

Beneath Jehovah's guardian care,

Her sons still watched against their foes,
While to their God they made their pray'r.

Though conscious that His sheltering might
Was spread o'er their beleaguer'd band;
Each workman ready for the fight,

Wrought with his weapon in his hand.

And we when now fierce foes without
Leagued with more deadly foes within,
Beset our Church's walls about,

Where many a breach gives hope to win;

Have we our trust in earth or heaven?

Here only learn we safety's way,
To use the means which God has given,
Arm'd for the conflict while we pray.

Then sceptic and sectarian hate,

And Popish plot will all be vain;

New life our Church will animate,
And every breach be built again.

But England then may well despair,
If in her troubles she shall see

Her children fighting-without prayer,
Or praying-without energy.

G. H.

PROTESTANT REFUGES IN IRELAND.

FOR some time past the Rev. Edward Nangle of the Achill Mission, has been in England; the time of his departure, we presume, now draws nigh, and we are thereby reminded of a duty. We cannot let him return home without publicly wishing him God speed, and proclaiming the importance of the work he has commenced, the astonishing Christian heroism with which he has carried it on, and the consequent strong claim his Mission has on the sympathies, the prayers, and the liberality of all truly Christian people. From what we personally have seen and know of Mr. Nangle, and from what we have heard from those who have visited his settlement, we and all others who have had these means of judging, take a deep and lively interest in the Achill Mission, and regard with sincere Christian affection, its pious founder. Mr. Nangle has sounded the Gospel in a desert place,

where there was originally no sort of encouragement, where persecution awaited him. But he went to that Island in the strength of the Lord of Hosts, and the Spirit of the mighty God acknowledged his labors, and brought home many to Christ. The poor deluded Papists were then stirred up to hostility; their leader, Archbishop McHale, visited the settlement, and raved against its inmates, while the government neglected to protect them, and even refused them any easier access to justice than that which they possessed in a journey of about thirty miles to the County town of Mayo for a warrant, and another journey to the same place the following week for a hearing! We are thankful that undauntedly the missionaries pressed on, and that under the shadow of the Almighty's wings, with two or three exceptions, they have abode in safety. They have now made Achill, once a barren rock with a degraded population, the seat of civilization; they have chapels and schools, plantations, neat cottages, gardens, and a good Hotel for visitors, who recently have flocked there in considerable numbers.

Something similar has been done at Dingle in Kerry; but here, converts are educated for missionaries, and all converts are invited to seek shelter from persecution. Other establishments of the same kind have elsewhere, we believe, been in contemplation, and there are some more settlements almost equally worthy of notice. To these two, however, we for the present confine ourselves, strongly urging their just claims on the liberality of the Protestants of Great Britain. The Committee of the Protestant Association will always be happy to receive and forward Donations to these Institutions; and a monthly Newspaper, the Achill Missionary Herald, published in that Island, may be obtained through the Committee for the small subscription of four shillings a year.

MAYNOOTH COLLEGE.

WE are enabled to lay before our readers the following Circular and Petition which the Committee of the Protestant Association have adopted for the Year 1840. Each speaks for itself, and therefore all comments from us would be superfluous; but we cannot produce them without expressing our earnest hope that the subject of Maynooth College will not be allowed to drop, now that public attention has been so much called to it. Let those who have procured petitions before, do so again; and with an increased number of signatures. Let those who have not petitioned before, discharge now their consciences and their duty. So at length the monstrous inconsistency of a Protestant nation educating priests to teach Popery, will be forced on the serious

consideration of the Legislature, and by the blessing of God be

removed.

Sir,

Protestant Association Office,

2, Exeter Hall, London. 1st January, 1840.

I am directed by the Committee of the Protestant Association to call your attention to the accompanying Petition, which they have again felt it their duty to adopt, against the annual Parliamentary Grant to the Popish College of Maynooth.

In the session 1837-38, Petitions with about 11,000 signatures were presented against this vote; while, in the course of last session, the Petitions on the subject were 199, and the signatures, 51,202. By suitable exertions the Committee hope that this progressive increase may be continued; and if so, they confidently anticipate that the important question of the endowment of Popery, will at length be forced on the serious attention of the Legislature.

With this object in view, I now appeal to you for your cooperation, earnestly requesting your aid in an undertaking in which the labour of a few more years-probably of the present year-must, with God's blessing, ensure success, and so relieve the nation of the responsibility of fostering Antichristian error in a seminary for the education of the Popish priesthood.

Petitions, if under six ounces weight, may be sent free of Postage to Members of Parliament, when left open at the ends, and marked with the word "Petition" on the cover; otherwise they may be forwarded in a parcel to me, and I will relieve you of further trouble by attending to their early presentation.

I am, Sir,

Your obedient servant,

EDWARD DALTON,

Secretary.

PETITION AGAINST MAYNOOTH COLLEGE.

The Petition of the undersigned inhabitants of Humbly sheweth,

That your petitioners, receiving the written word of God as the only true standard of faith and morals, are convinced by its testimony that the peculiar tenets of the Church of Rome, as defined and settled at the Council of Trent, are Anti-christian, idolatrous, anti-social, and utterly incapable of being reconciled with the genuine doctrines of the Gospel.

That those heresies were solemnly and consistently repudiated by this country for many generations, during which the blessing of Almighty God descended upon the Government in a marked and unprecedented manner.

That your petitioners, therefore, deeply lament that a College for the instruction of a Popish priesthood has been established, and is now supported, at Maynooth, in Ireland, by grants from the public Treasury; and they fear that this measure, being a participation in the guilt of idolatry, and a dereliction of the principles of our Protestant Constitution, is calculated to draw down Divine judgments on the nation.

Your petitioners would further remind your Honourable House that it has been proved, by the most satisfactory information given in evidence before both Houses of Parliament, and a Royal Commission appointed to investigate the state of Irish education. as well as by the uniform testimony of actual experience, that the objects contemplated by those statesmen who recommended the establishment of the College have in no respect been attained: but that, on the contrary, that Institution has proved the chief source of seditious turbulence, as well as of superstitious delusion and religious discord in Ireland.

Your petitioners, therefore, on every ground of principle, policy, and consistency, humbly pray your Honourable House to withdraw every kind of public support from the Popish College of Maynooth.

And your petitioners, &c.

ANTI-CHURCH COMMITTEE OF EDUCATION.

THE following Letter concludes the Correspondence between the
Committee of Privy Council and the National School Society.
"National Society's Office,
Sanctuary, Westminster,

"November 28."

"Sir, "I have the honor to acknowledge your letter of the 31st ult., stating that the Lords of the Committee of Council on Education cannot abandon the condition of inspection with respect to the appropriation of £5000. to the training School of the National Society.

"The Committee of the National Society direct me to inform you in reply, that they will not consider themselves at liberty to accept the Grant so long as the above condition is attached to it. I had also the honour to receive your letter of the 9th inst., declaring that their Lordships 'hold the condition of inspection to be indispensable,' and will not forego it even in the case of applicants for aid' who have presumed that the appropriation of the public funds voted in the present year for the promotion of education would be confided to the Treasury, and administered as in past years.'