ANNUAL MEETING OF THE SUNDAY SCHOOL UNION, AT EXETER HALL.

Exeter Hall!-Who has not heard its name? Amongst the many stately monuments erected to benevolence and christianity in the metropolis of our land, it stands preeminent. It is the rallying point for all friends and pro

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moters of science, humanity, and religion. It is the Mount Zion of modern days, beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth.' What hallowed scenes have been witnessed within its walls! What crowded assemblages have been convened within its precincts to further the interests of education, the triumph of Missions, the oneness of the church, the glory of God! What thrilling speeches have been delivered there before tens of thousands, all mute in breathless attention, bowing their spirits in penitence for the neglect of acknowledged obligations, and nerving them to new achievements in faith and zeal!

Exeter Hall in May !-This is its festive and halcyon season-its spring time and glory.-Then may be seen "The Tree of Life' in the midst of her, blooming with the rich promises of a future and abundant harvest,—whose leaves are for the present healing of the nations ;-peace flowing through her as a river, full of water, to make glad the city of God, and compassion, kindled with love for souls, for guilty, perishing man, hastening her servants forth to the abodes of wretchedness, cruelty, and idolism, with the character and the commission of the Angels who appeared in the plains of Bethlehem-Fear not; for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.' Who will not pray that from this spot, as the fountain-head of holy and evangelical influence, streams may issue unimpeded in their flow, until they have encircled the globe, and irrigated the desert into the fertility and beauteousness of Eden, the Garden of the Lord?

Thirteen years have passed away since the handsome and commodious edifice represented in the engraving, was completed. Feeling the great necessity there existed for a central hall, consecrated to the high purposes already stated, and common to all the admirers and advocates of philanthropy, literature, and evangelism, several influential gentlemen suggested the plan of such a room, which was readily adopted and executed.

In describing it to his young readers, the author of London in May,' writes, Exeter Hall is a large building in which you may lose yourself. The length of it is between forty and fifty yards. Then it is seventy-six feet wide and forty-five feet high. The ceiling and upper parts are beautifully ornamented, with an elegant moulding running through the cornices, panels, door and window cases. Then there are tall pillars, which rise to the very ceiling,

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with beautiful Corinthian capitals. The great room or hall in which the public meetings take place, will hold at least three thousand people. As you go up stairs, and down, and along the different passages, you see, on almost door the name of some benevolent society. Charity seems to have taken up her dwelling there.'

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THE TWINKLING OF AN EYE.

In writing to the Thessalonians respecting the resurrection of true christians, and their preparation for the heavenly state, St. Paul says, 'We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye.' On this passage, the late Rev. Greville Ewing, in a funeral sermon for his friend Mr. Aikman, of Edinburgh, has the following beautiful remarks. "What is

'the twinkling of an eye?' It is the vigilance of an almost self-acting protector, which, quicker than thought prevents the danger to the precious but delicate organ, which might be brought by every passing breeze. It is the relief of the eye, in the case of attentive, prolonged observation. It refreshes the power of vision, which must otherwise be soon exhausted, and enables with increased clearness and enjoyment to sustain and extend the exercise, and of course the pleasure, of this the noblest of all the senses. And so far from being strange or unknown, it is so familiar that it happens to us fifty times every hour of the day, without our being aware that it has happened to us at all. We close our eyes and open them instantly on the same scene,

and therefore we know not that we had closed them. Even so, in this safe, refreshing, and gentle manner, the christian at his death closes his eyes on things seen and temporal,' and opens them within the vail, on 'things unseen and eternal.' At once there is a change of scene, and a change of state. The exhausted eye could no longer look on the receding shadows of time. It was closed for a moment in unnoticed darkness. It opened, by a new creation, with a power of beholding steadily the contrasted brightness of immutable glory. It twinkled never to twinkle again.' In this manner may Mr. Ewing be said to have described his own sudden and happy death, on which account the passage is appended to the valuable Memoir,' recently published by his daughter, Mrs. Matheson. May all our young friends carefully study and imitate the christian character, that their latter end may be peace!

Rugeley.

J. B.

A FEARFUL FAILURE.

[In our February Magazine it was stated, that the Superintendents and Teachers at Bicester, were assiduously tracing out the progress of those scholars who were in the congregational school twenty years back. Believing that such inquiries would develop appalling results, we requested a beloved brother' in that town, to forward us the facts in figures.' He has done so, and we thank him for it.-EDITOR.]

• Were there not ten cleansed? but where are the nine?'

Luke xvii. 17.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUNDAY SCHOOL MAGAZINE.

SIR,-Should the following statistical facts be thought worthy of a place in your well-conducted and widely-circulated magazine, they are at your service. The number of children who received a religious education at the Sabbath school, in connexion with the congregational church at Bicester, Oxon, from June, 1823, to June, 1824, was 158. Of this number two have united with the dissenting church in the town, and other two attend the chapel, but they are not pious characters. Five have joined the Wesleyan Society in the town, and a few attend the parish church. The total number out of the 158, in whose genuine piety we have full confidence is seven! Twelve of the above number have turned out complete profligates; two are in a lunatic asylum, and, alas, many of them are confirmed drunkards. Forty-two of them live in their native town or parish, but they are not regular in their attendance at any place of worship. Thirteen are living in London, fifteen at Oxford, and twenty-nine at different villages in the counties of Oxford, Buckingham, &c. Two have gone to America, one lives in Scotland, two are in the army, and thirty-three have died. About twenty of them are doing well, so far as this world is concerned, nine are engaged as servants, fifty-four as field labourers, and eighty are married. Those of the 158 who have settled in other parts of the kingdom have turned out better men and better women than their school-fellows who have remained in and about Bicester.

These statistics are a faithful but melancholy demonstration of the degraded and irreligious state of society in many of our agricultural provinces. I have not ceased for five years to call the attention of the religious public to the heart-rending and immoral state of some parts of the county in which I labour, but very few are willing to believe that things are as bad as they have been represented. Dissenters as well as churchmen in our neighbourhood,

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have been 'at ease in Zion,' and too many of those who were trained in the congregational Sabbath school, in Bicester, have been led astray and ruined by the thousands in the town and neighbourhood 'who glory in their shame,' and live to pervert the right ways of the Lord.' When I settled at Bicester five years ago, I had no idea that such a state of things as I have since been compelled to witness and to feel, existed in any part of the rural districts. The day shall declare it.' W. F.

These statements from an agricultural town, to which we believe similar ones might be gathered from the manufacturing districts, are most arousing. The heart throbs at the results given. Out of 158 only seven are known to have become religious; while twelve have become notorious profligates. Such facts demand the most intense thought. How are they to be explained? How are they to be used? Conversion to God we take to be the great and immediate object of every Sunday school. Here has been a distressing failure. We dare not profane the character of God by supposing that he was accessary to it. No, the reason must be found in man, not in God; in Earth, not in Heaven. We would ask whether the teachers were really pious persons? If so, did they look on the conversion of the scholars as a matter of just and immediate expectation? And did they wrestle with both their scholars and their God for this success? Did they take the right method to preserve their scholars from that master-vice, intemperance? Were the scholars frequently singled out, and conversed with on the state of their souls? And when they left the school, were the scholars followed by the frequent visits or letters of their teachers? We put these questions not in reference to Bicester merely; we put them to the friends there, only as to a sounding-board, echoing all over our land the searching inquiries we wish instituted. Great and immeasurable good has unquestionably arisen from Sunday schools. We, however, regard the good simply as an indication of what the system can do, when it is properly worked,-worked by all the intelligence, the faith, the fervour of the Church of God. Why is it we ask, that the spirit of Christ so seldom visits our schools. Ought they not to be the chosen scenes of his most gracious and extensive operation? Let every teacher and every scholar lay his hand upon his heart, and ask his God why it is not so?