THE EVANGELICAL INSTRUCTOR. PART I. AN ESSAY ON READING. IN subordination to Divine Providence, we stand indebted to the agency of men for a variety of inventions, which have wonderfully contributed to diffuse knowledge and happiness through a dark and miserable world. In the great catalogue presented to our view in the instructive page of history, the art of Printing occupies a very conspicuous place: for it is productive of consequences as lasting as our existence. 2. This light dawned first upon Germany, about the middle of the fifteenth century. It was particularly through the then new medium of the press, that the principles of the Reformation, which was begun by Luther about fifty years after, were promulgated with incredible rapidity, and became triumphant over all the subtlety and rage of its dignified opposers. 3. This important discovery opens to us a thousand rich mines of wisdom and pleasure; and, however it may be abused by the vanity of some, and the wickedness of others, it shall nevertheless be instrumental in bringing a large and lasting tribute of glory to the Redeemer. 추 4. The Holy Scriptures should be loved with greater ardor, and studied with more attention, than any other book whatever; because they contain sentiments more interesting, beauties more captivating, and sublimities more astonishing. 5. They are not only to be read, but treasured up in our memories. We should avail ourselves of every cir eumstance that may conduct us to the knowledge of their import, and enable us with facility and energy to apply their essential truths to ourselves. Then we shall wisely at least, if not successfully, contend with an infidel race, and wipe away the odium of embracing sentiments unexamined by the word and testimony of Jesus. Then we shall improve our faculties, illustrate our principles, enlarge our usefulness, and abound in those consolations, which, like the widow's cruse of oil, will increase as they are poured out, and which will at last be absorbed in the pleasures of heaven. 6. Every man of true piety and taste, finds in the Scriptures both instruction and delight. He reads other books with a view to the knowledge and enjoyment of this; and estimates their worth according to the measure in which they are calculated to promote the object of his desire. 7. But we cannot help deploring that wilful ignorance which is the only distinction of great numbers who profess themselves the advocates of Gospel truth, Being too gay, too busy, or too idle, to exert themselves. in the cultivation of their minds, they suffer them, like the field of the slothful, to be quite overrun with thorns and nettles. 8. Sometimes, perhaps, they may yawn away ten minutes over a valuable book; but are seldom, if ever, inspired with life and vigor. They relish nothing so much as the sentimental licentiousness of a Sterne, or the subtle poison of some dangerous novel. Novels, generally speaking, are instruments of abomination and ruin. A fond attachment to them is an irrefragable evidence of a mind contaminated, and totally unfitted for the serious pursuits of study, or the delightful exercises and enjoyments of religion. 9. It must be confessed, that even books of an opposite description-books which combine important instruction and untainted pleasure, will, if they preclude punctual attention to the duties of our respective stations, be read too much. 10. When we depart from the order established by Infinite Wisdom, and the obligations by which we are individually bound, we stand guilty before Him, who has made every thing beautiful in its season. There are many things of vast consequence to ourselves and others, that books cannot teach, and many pleasures which they cannot communicate; and which are found only in the more active walks of human life. Yet proper opportunities of reading will, under the Divine blessing, make those who prize and improve them, like trees, that yield abundance of delicious and wholesome fruit. 11. To reading and reflection, some part of every day, if possible, should be inviolably sacred. He who never reads, forgets that he is rational; and he who never reads with a thirst for spiritual knowledge, forgets that he is immortal. As our understandings improve by our acquaintance with Divine revelation, and with the writ ings of great and good men, we shall, in our progress through the vale of imperfection, and sorrow, participate of unnumbered joys, to which the trifling and the indolent are strangers. 12. An elegant writer observes, that "Sorrow is a kind of rust to the soul; which every new idea contributes in its passage to scour away. It is the putrefaction of stagnant life, and is remedied by exercise and motion." The ignorant, as they are easily elated by the fluctuating brightness of prosperity, so they are the first to fall a prey in the hour of adversity to grief and despair. They are then like ships on the boisterous sea, without cargo, and without ballast; while those whose minds are stored with the acquisition of true wisdon, remain secure amidst the storms of life, and gradually approach that haven of everlasting rest, where they will know even as they are known. 13. The lover of useful books, when he is not governed by reserve or pedantry, conciliates esteem, and communicates pleasure, in the various departments of social life. He perceives the justice of Lord Bacon's remark, that "Reading makes a full man, and conversation a ready man;" therefore he indulges, at proper times, in the pleasures of cheerful company and conversation. 14. But gaming and detraction, profaneness and dissipation, he holds in absolute abhorrence: with those assemblies in which these are countenanced, he never unites. His heart is with them who love instruction, and with such as delight in the communication of it. Adorned with Christian humility, he makes no ostentatious display of his natural or acquired talents. He never indulges the unmanly thought of treating inferior sense and information with contempt; but while he secretly adores the Providence that has blessed him with higher advantages, he endeavors to lead others into the pleasing paths of wisdom. 16. When inspired with such sentiments, and pursuing such a line of conduct, how amiable do men appear! These are qualities, the possession of which is of more consequence than the conquest and possession of the universe. 16. Does the reader earnestly desire to obtain them? Let him make use of those means which Providence has placed in his power, and humbly implore the blessing of Him who delights to make his creatures wise and happy. Let him remember, that opportunity will not last for ever. Time will shortly moulder the hands that now write, in the dust, and still the breast that now throbs at the reflection. But let not this be read as something that relates only to another: it is applicable to every individual who peruses what is here written. This aw ful truth, however obvious, and however reiterated, is yet frequently forgotten; for surely, if we did not lose our remembrance, or at least our sensibility, that view would always predominate in our lives, which alone can afford us comfort when we die. PRESENT NEGLECT OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. AMIDST the variety of instances of the present de clension of religion, the inattention of parents "professing godliness," to the spiritual welfare of their chil dren, is one of the most lamentable and conspicuous. This complaint does not arise from a censoriousness of |