can explain it to me as you have promised; but I was going to say, only I forgot, when my cousins grow up, cannot they too be baptized of their own accord if they like? F. Oh yes; I was baptized, christened, as they call it, myself; but the text we have mentioned (Mark xvi. 16), so struck

my mind that, after much enquiry, and hardly thinking it possible my good parents could have been mistaken, I was yet led to see the truth, and gladly professed my faith in Christ by baptism in his name.

Well, we must now get ready for the afternoon service.

THE TWO DIAMONDS.-Rabbi Meer had two sons, both arrived at the age of manhood, of excellent abilities, and highly accomplished. Business of a pressing nature had compelled the father to leave his home for a considerable time, and to visit a distant place. When the time of his return was drawing near, a malignant disorder, which had spread over the city with terrible devastation, attacked the lads, and they both soon after died. Their mother, who witnessed their last agonies, was enabled, by her strength of piety, to ascribe glory to God, even in this dreadful visitation. She, however, knew that her husband was most tenderly attached to his sons, and was, therefore, in fear for the effect which such unexpected calamity would have upon him. Accordingly, upon his return, when she had evaded his inquiries about them for a considerable time, finding him to grow more eager to see them, she said thus to him:

My dear, I want to ask you a question. Some time ago, a friend of mine lent me two valuable diamonds, and as she did not ask for them for a long time, I began to think she had given them to me: but she has lately been very urgent, and has demanded them of me. Now, shall I give them up or keep them? they are very valuable." To this the good rabbi replied, "I am astonished, my love, to hear you ask such a question as this; you must decidedly return them, and that as soon as possible, and without hesitation. I should have thought you would have known better than to imagine you had any right to them." His wife then led him, with tears in her eyes (for she was very affectionate), into the apartment where she had laid her sons. At the sight of the corpses, the father was thrown into a paroxysm of grief, and uttered the most woful ejaculations. "Oh! my sons, my sons!" he cried. "Give me my sons! How can I part with you? The pride of my heart, the delight of my grey hairs, the solace of my woes, 'the soul of my pleasures! Oh! my sons, my sons!" and he was almost stifled by the bitterness of his sobs. "Remember," said his wife, what you told me just now. You must not grieve, and be disconsolate at the loss of your sons, but freely deliver them up to the Lord, for they are his." It cost the wretched father a severe struggle, but his piety prevailed, and he exclaimed, "Yes, they are

the Lord's. The Lord has given, and the Lord has taken away, and blessed be the name of the Lord."

RELIGIOUS CONFORMITY.-Well knows he who uses to consider, that our faith and knowledge thrive by exercise, as well as our limbs and complexion. Truth is compared, in Scripture, to a streaming fountain; if the waters flow not in a perpetual progression, they sicken into a muddy pool of conformity and tradition. A man may be a heretic in the truth; and if he believe things only because his pastor says so, or the assembly so determines, without knowing other reason, though his belief be true, yet the very truth he holds becomes his heresy. There is not any burden, that some would gladlier put off to another, than the charge and care of their religion. There be (who knows not that there be of Protestants and professors ?) who live and die in as errant and implicit faith, as any lay papist of Loretto. A wealthy man, addicted to his pleasure, and to his profit, finds religion to be a traffic so entangled, and of so many piddling accounts, that, of all mysteries, he cannot skill to keep a stock going upon that trade. What should he do? Fain he would have the name to be religious; fain he would bear up with his neighbours in that. What does he, therefore, but resolves to give over toiling, and to find himself out some factor, to whose care and credit he may commit the whole managing of his religious affairs some divine of note and estimation that must be. To him he adheres; resigns the whole warehouse of his religion, with all the locks and keys, into his custody; and, indeed, makes the very person of that man his religion; esteems his associating with him a sufficient evidence, and commendatory, of his own piety. So that a man may say his religion is now no more within himself, but is become a dividual movable, and goes and comes near him according as that good man frequents the house. He entertains him, gives him gifts, feasts him, lodges him; his religion comes home at night, prays, is liberally supped, and sumptuously laid to sleep; rises, is saluted, and after the malmsey, or some well-spiced bruage, and better breakfasted than he whose morning appetite would have gladly fed on green figs, between Bethany and

Jerusalem, his religion walks abroad at eight, and leaves his kind entertainer in the shop, trading all day without religion. Milton.

ANECDOTE OF THE LATE REV. ROBERT HALL. In conversation with Mr. John Green, Mr. Hall related the following circumstance: When I was a little boy, my father took me to the school of Mr. Ryland, at Northampton, father of Dr. Ryland of Bristol. This Mr. Ryland was very eccentric, and a violent partisan of the Americans. It was in the hottest period of the war, sir, and many persons were very indignant at the conduct of the English government. That war, sir, was considered as a crusade against the liberty of the subject, and the rights of man. The first night we arrived at Northampton, sir, the two old gentlemen (my father and Mr. Ryland) talked over American politics, until they both became heated on the same side of the question. At length, Mr. Ryland burst forth in this manner: "Brother Hall, I will tell you what I would do, if I were General Washington." "Well," said my father, "what would you do ?" "Why, Brother Hall, if I were General Washington, I would summon all the American officers; they should form a circle round me, and I would address them, and we would offer a libation with our own blood; and I would order one of them to bring a lancet and a punch-bowl, and I would be the first to lay bare my arm; and when the punch-bowl was full, and we had all been bled, I would call on every man to consecrate himself to the work, by dipping his sword into the bowl, and entering into a solemn covenant engagement, by oath, one to another-and we would swear by Him that sitteth upon the throne, and liveth for ever and ever-that we would never sheathe our swords while there was an English soldier in arms remaining in America: and that is what I would do, Brother Hall." Only conceive, sir, my situation: a poor, little boy, that had never been out of his mother's chimney corner before, sir, sitting by these two old gentlemen, and hearing this conversation about blood. Sir, I trembled at the idea of being left with such a bloody-minded master. Why, sir, I began to think he would no more mind bleeding me, after my father was gone, than he would killing a fly. I quite expected to be bled, sir.

GOD'S BOOK OF REMEMBRANCE.-Among the books that will be opened when God shall reckon with the universe, one will be produced, filled with costlier records than the common transactions of time. In that precious volume-that "book of remembrance written before him, for those that feared the Lord, and thought upon his name"-how many little acts of the humblest saint, which the world never knew or noticed, will appear in golden capitals! How many forgotten words and looks of kindness, which dropped a healing anodyne into some broken heart, will there be shown the child of God, who fain will ask, "When did I this?" How brightly in those leaves

of pearl will glow that pellucid jewel, which fell from the eye of him who gave all he had to give a tear for another's woe! And the poor widow's mite-what a bright record shall be made of that, and of the midnight prayer she made for those pinched with sterner wants than hers! What a page in that heavenly Album will be given to him who gave a cup of cold water to a disciple of the Lamb, with a heart big enough to have given the world! There will be shown the tableaux vivants of prison scenes, and sick and dying bed scenes, where eyes with a heaven full of love in them, and hearts big with the immortal sympathy of God, ministered to the sick stranger, and him that was ready to perish. In that Souvenir of eternity, will be preserved charities of celestial water, that never found a record or remembrance on earth.-Elihu Burritt.

BURNING THE BIBLE.-A Society of gentlemen, most of whom had enjoyed a liberal education, and were persons of polished manners, but had unhappily imbibed infidel principles, used to assemble at each other's houses, for the purpose of ridiculing the Scriptures, and hardening one another in their unbelief. At last they unanimously formed a resolution to burn the bible, and so to be troubled no more with a book which was so hostile to their principles, and disquieting to their consciences. A large

fire was prepared,-a bible was laid on the table, and a flowing bowl was made ready to drink its dirge. For the execution of their plan, they fixed upon a young gentleman of high birth, brilliant vivacity, and elegance of manners. He undertook the task, and after a few enlivening glasses, amidst the applause of his jovial compeers, approached the table, took up the bible, and was walking leisurely forward, to put it into the fire; but, as his eye fastened on it, all at once he was seized with trembling, paleness overspread his countenance, and he seemed convulsed. He turned to the table, and laying down the bible, said, with a strong asseveration, "We will not burn that book, till we get a better.

MORAL EVIL.-It is almost awful to look at the overwhelming beauty around me, and then think of moral evil. It seems as if heaven and hell, instead of being separated by a great gulf from one another, were absolutely on each other's confines, and indeed not far from every one of us. Might the sense of moral evil be as strong in me as my delight in external beauty, for in a deep sense of moral evil, more perhaps than in any thing else, abides a saving knowledge of God! It is not so much to admire moral good; that we may do, and yet not be conformed to it; but if we do really abhor that which is evil,-not the persons in whom evil resides, but the evil which dwelleth in them, and, much more manifestly and certainly to our own knowledge, in our hearts -this is to have the feeling of God and of Christ, and to have our spirit in sympathy with the Spirit of God.-Dr. Arnold.

BAPTIST FOREIGN MISSIONS.

OUR MISSION.-ITS EFFICIENCY.

[We trust that our ministering brethren will call the attention of all their members to the following facts at their next Missionary Prayer Meeting.-EDS.]

In our last Missionary article we observed that the time had now come when our Mission must be carried on as a solemn duty; that novelty and excitement could no longer avail to the extent they hitherto have done, and that we must look now, as we think, chiefly to the steady, patient, believing efforts of our churches themselves, to raise the amount of money, which the Lord expects our Denomination to furnish, toward the great work which lies before them. We

did not mean to intimate that either the management of our Society, or its success compared with that of any other christian agency, was at all discouraging; we felt assured to the contrary; and the following paper, kindly furnished at our request, by our invaluable Secretary, will fully bear out this remark; it will impress on all our churches that their contributions are very carefully used, and that the spiritual good to which they are subservient, is fully equal to what God is doing elsewhere by the same amount of effort.

To one sentence our readers will see we invite special attention. We shall have occasion to recur to it again, probably in our next number. We hope that before then many of our churches (would we might say, ALL!) will have begun to act upon it. We are naturally advocates of penny efforts. We intend to lay before the churches a very practical plan to render such efforts easy, interesting, and permanent. The paper we adverted to is the following:

COMPARISONS.

BY THE REV. J. ANGUS.

Comparisons are said, in the proverb, to be odious. If persons are compared, there is danger of exciting envy or pride. If things are compared, the comparison is called analogy; and analogies are very apt to mislead the judgment, and bias the feelings.

And yet comparisons have their value. When made with accuracy, they enlighten the mind, enable it to understand things distant by a reference to things at hand, and produce a proportionately deep impression upon the heart.

Will our readers go with us, while we apply to the Baptist Missionary Society the rule of comparison, with the view of illustrating its success, and of deepening in the church a sense of its importance and claims? COMPARISON OF CONTRIBUTION; OR, WHAT IS DONE BY THE CHURCHES FOR THE HEATHEN.

The income of the Baptist Missionary Society is £25,000 for all purposes, not including what is raised and spent by the churches abroad, in meeting their own expenses. The churches that give this sum, spend on themselves, and on home objects, at least eight times as much. £25,000 for the world, and £200,000 for England!

All denominations combined, support in India 150 missionaries. The London City Mission supports an equal number in London. One hundred and fifty millions of people have one missionary to a million. London has 75 missionaries to a million, and four or five hundred pastors besides.

Patna is as populous as Manchester, and has in all two Protestant missionaries. There are more Baptist ministers in Lancashire than in all India.

Brittany contains three millions of Romanists, and has, of all denominations, three missionaries among them.

The state of Africa, of South America, and of innumerable countries of the globe, is more destitute still.

If each member of every Baptist church in Great Britain, would give on the average only ONE PENNY a week for the conversion of the world, the Society would have several thousand pounds every year more than their present income. With many subscribers of £20 and upwards, we have not, even with their subscriptions, a penny a week from each of the members of our churches.

COMPARISON OF LABOUR; OR, WHAT IS DONE WITH THE MONEY.

The home expenses of the Baptist Missionary Society are much less, in proportion, than those of any other similar institution.

The home expenses of the Society are less, in proportion, by one-third, than they were in the days of Mr. Fuller.

With an income of not more than £16,000, available for the support of missionaries, more than seventy missionaries are supported (not including Jamaica), and about 150 native teachers, or 220 in all. A large number for so small a sum, and in countries so expensive.*

In Jamaica, there is property in trust worth more than all the Society has spent there for all purposes.

is allowed, on the average, about £200.

At least one half of the volumes of scriptures that are circulated from Calcutta, are circulated by the agents of the Baptist Missionary Society.

Out of 300,000 tracts issued by the Calcutta Tract Society for all India, in one year, 160,000 were distributed by the agents of the Baptist Missionary Society.

An amount equal to at least half of the income of the Society, is raised at the various Stations abroad for different purposes, and not included in the Society's income, though an account of it is sent home.

Every missionary sent out, draws forth two native teachers; and every pound given, has, in the end, drawn forth 10s. of local help.

COMPARISON OF SUCCESS; OR, HOW HAS GOD BLESSED IT.

The additions to churches in India have been, on the average, as large as additions to churches at home; in other parts of the world, much larger: so that 100 missionaries have as many converts under their care as 300 pastors in England.

There is but one Missionary Society with a larger number of members connected with its churches; and in that case, the number, when compared with income, is not larger.

If these facts excite any other less appropriate feeling than gratitude, humility, and holy resolution to aid this cause in a way more commensurate with its wants and claims, the writer will have missed his object. Let us thank God, take courage, and by continuance in well-doing, be prepared for yet richer success.

Brethren, now is the time to commence a noiseless, but universal and steady effort; one of such a kind as will last till Missionary Societies expire in the universal conversion of the world.

THE POWER OF VOLUNTARY RELIGION CHURCHES & CHAPELS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM.

The comparative numbers of Churchmen and Dissenters in the United Kingdom, are a matter of considerable interest, and even importance. Very erroneous statements are often made on both sides; the materials for forming a comparison are scattered; it will therefore be of utility, to make any nearer approach than has been hitherto made to an accurate estimate. In the course of remarks at an Anti-State-Church meeting recently held in Leeds, Mr. Edward Baines, jun. adduced the number of places of worship built and maintained by Dissenters in this kingdom, as one among many proofs of the power of the voluntary principle. From the valuable statement made by him, we arrive at the following results :

From the Clergy List of 1845, we find that the number of churches and chapels of the Establishment in England and Wales, in the year 1844, was about 12,100. Allow

Thus it would appear, that there is a greater number of places of worship belonging to the Nonconformists than to the Established Church, even in that part of the kingdom where the Establishment is the strongest. It does not of course follow, that there is a greater number of Nonconformists than of Churchmen. There are many places where the great bulk of the population attend the Church, and where the Dissenting chapels are small, and scantily attended. The churches would in general accommodate much larger numbers than the chapels. But, on the other hand. many of the churches are in parishes of very small population. Of 14,453 parishes and townships in England, no fewer than 9181 have a population below 400 persons each. Many of the churches which abound in cathedral cities, and other old towns, as well as in villages, have very scanty congregations. The Dissenting chapels exist in the greatest number where the population is the most dense; and in the manufacturing districts, at least, the Dissenting congrega

tions are larger than the Church congregations. On the whole, however, we do not doubt that the number of Churchmen exceeds that of Dissenters, in England and Wales; and, of course, in point of wealth, the Church has an immense superiority. But the above figures lead to the belief that the numerical majority of the Church is much smaller than many writers have assumed. And it is surely a fact which most strikingly demonstrates the power of the voluntary principle, that the Nonconformist bodies of England and Wales, beside contributing to the support of the Church, and in the face of many discouragements, have built, and are maintaining, no less than 12,700 places of worship, and support their ministers and service, without the aid of sixpence from any public funds.

In Scotland there is a decided majority against the Presbyterian Establishment. The following numbers of churches and chapels approach to correctness :

Churches and Chapels in Scotland.

United Presbyterian Church

1160

5411

The Established clergy, therefore, are much more numerous in proportion than their flocks; not a few of the clergy have not a church to preach in, and not a few of the churches are without congregations. At least 3000 chapels must have been built, and are now upheld by the poorest part of the population, entirely without Government aid, except the allowances made under the name of Regium Donum, to the Unitarian and other Presbyterian ministers of the North of Ireland-the benumbing and deadening effects of which have lately been exhibited on official authority.

It would appear from the above, that the places of worship belonging to the Established Churches and the Nonconformist bodies in the United Kingdom, are as follows:

Places of Worship-United Kingdom.

Belonging to Belonging to

the Esta- the Nonblishment. conformists.

Church of Scotland

518

Congregational..

142

United Original Seceder

41

Reformed Presbyterian Church

30

Scottish Episcopal Church

109

Baptist

91

Roman Catholic

82

Wesleyan Methodist

In Scotland..

1,160

1,983

32

Evangelical Union

Various minor Sects (supposed)

Total of Nonconformist bodies

1983

Thus the Nonconformist chapels exceed the churches of the Scotch Establishment, by 823. But when it is remembered that great numbers of the churches of the Establishment were absolutely emptied by the secession of the Free Church, it will be obvious that the numerical majority of Dissenters must be much greater than in proportion to the number of their places of worship.

In Ireland the Establishment has only about one-ninth of the population attached to it, whilst the other eight-ninths are Dissenters or Roman Catholics. The following are the numbers given by the commissioners appointed to enquire into the state of religious and other instruction in Ireland, in the year 1834:

In Ireland (supposed)

Total..

But the proportions of the population attached to the respective religious communities must be different. We are inclined to believe, that the actual attendance at the churches of the Establishment in England and Wales, would exceed the attendants at Dissenting and other chapels in the proportion of four to three. We think that in Scotland the proportion to the Established Church would be, compared with the other religious bodies, as two to five. And in Ireland, the proportion of Churchmen to the other sects, is as one to eight. If, for the sake of ascertaining what we may term the comparative religious weight of the Establishment and the other sects, we divide the population of Great Britain and Ireland according to these proportions (though we are aware that there are great numbers who attend no place of worship, and belong to no religious body), the result would be as follows:

Computed Numbers belonging to the Establishment and other Religious Bodies in the United Kingdom.