Rev. S. R. Bridenbaugh, E. C. Baringer, Rev. A. Bartholomew, M. J. Dieffenderfer, A. The "Guardian" entered upon its thirtieth volume with the 1st of January. It has reached a ripe age, and can refer with pride to its past history. It has strong claims on its various patrons, which, we trust, they will duly recognize, not only by prompt payment of their individual subscriptions, but also by earnest efforts to add new names to the list of subscribers. Address: The Guardian. VOL. XXX. Editorial Notes. FEBRUARY, 1879. WE have lately entered upon a new year; let us try to make it a year of great moral growth. The year 1879 comes but once in our lifetime. Strive to make a good record for it. If you are a wanderer from God, return at once. If you are His child, strive to improve in piety. Live more for Him; pray more, love more, forbear and forgive more. Become more earnest, sincere and active in your piety; then this will prove to be the happiest year of your life, and you will end it, whether on earth or in heaven, with such hymns of praise as you have never before felt or sung. NO. 2 short time this work passed through twelve editions. This was succeeded by many other tours through different parts of the world. Meanwhile, he was a foreign correspondent of the " New York Tribune," of which he was one of the owners. and He wrote 37 volumes of poetry prose-chiefly works of travel. He acquired a speaking knowledge of quite a number of languages. Although of English birth, he learned to speak the German as well as his native tongue. He was a Germanized American, a lover of German culture, literature and customs. This made him quite a ministerial favorite at the Imperial Court of Germany. His wife, a highly educated German lady, helped him much in his literary pursuits. Taylor was mainly distinguished as a journalist, traveler and a poet. We have always admired him as the Pennsylvania farmer's boy, who by his own energy and industry, without stooping to the low acts of a cunning trickster and a demagogue-so common among our young men, has raised himself to the foremost ranks of American authorship, of noble manhood and culture. On the 19th of December, Bayard Taylor, the American Minister to the German Empire, died in Berlin, aged 54 years. He was born in Chester County, Pa. The child of Quaker parents, his early years were spent on a farm in the plain, simple life peculiar to people of this faith. His school opportunities were comparatively few. Without a liberal or college education, he became a printer's apprentice at 17. He studied Latin and French as best he could. Before THE signers of the Declaration of Indelong he began to write for different pa-pendence are deservedly held in high espers, meanwhile carefully reading such teem. And their descendants justly pride useful books as he could procure. He themselves in their honorable lineage. was studious in his habits, with more than an average share of talent, a close observer of men and things with a restless desire to learn all about them he possibly could. Already, as a youth, he had a great desire to travel. At 19 he published a volume of poems. Two Philadelphia editors advanced him each $100 for foreign correspondence. With a small sum of money he made a European tour of two years afoot, the result of which he afterwards published in a volume entitled: Views Afoot, or Europe seen with Knapsack and Staff. In a But the heroic stuff which men like the quisition of wealth, lived beyond his income, was fond of parade and vain show. And now he has exchanged his palatial home for a felon's cell. DR. THOMAS CHALMERS, the foremost pulpit orator of his age, was a hero too, no less than our signers. His fame rang throughout the Christian world. Surely the children of such a man will grace the highest walks of social life; will live among the wealthy and the honored. Yes, of God, and of angels and of good people the life and work of his daughter are honored, and will be forever. But the proud selfish world knows little about her. How nobly she carries forward the blessed work of her father, and blesses his memory! In one of the alleys running off from Fountain Bridge, Edinburgh, a street crowded with drunkenness and pollution, is the low-roofed building in which this good woman is spending her life to help men and women out of their miseries. Her chief work is with drunkards, their wives and daughters. Some of the poor women of the neighborhood who have sober husbands complain against her, saying: 'Why do you pass us? Because our husbands are good, you do not care for us. If we had married some worthless sot, you would then have taken care of us in our poverty!" In the winter, when the nights are long and cold, you may see Helen Chalmers, with her lantern, going through the lanes of the city, hunting up the depraved, and bringing them to her reformmeetings. Insult her, do they? Never! They would as soon think of pelting an angel of God. Fearless and strong in the righteousness of her work, she goes up to a group of intoxicated men, shakes hands with them, and takes them along to hear the Thursday night speech on temperance. One night, as she was standing in a low tenement, talking to the intemperate father, and persuading him to a better life, a man kept walking up and down the room, as though interested in what was said; but finally, in his intoxication, he staggered up to her and remarked: "I shall go to heaven as easy as you will; do you think so?" Helen answered not a word, but opened her Bible and pointed to the passage, "No drunkard shall inherit the kingdom of God." The arrow struck between the joints of the harness, and that little piece of Christian stratagem ended in the man's reformation. ARE fathers and mothers and heads of families justifiable in taking those papers which are daily filled with matter which is only fit for a police gazette or a dime novel of the worst class? Is that the stuff on which to feed young boys and girls? Is that the pabulum for the young ladies of the household? Is it surprising that any who have such vile and wicked trash presented to them should themselves catch the contagion of this leprosy? The conductors of newspapers say that the people demand what they supply. The truth is that the papers have made and stimulated and are increasing the demand, and that the people whom they are corrupting will rot in the impurity in which they live. The remedies are in both direc tions. The papers and the people must reform. It matters little at which end the reformation begins. But if the decent and the religious people of the country will stop taking and reading these papers which offend, and will patronize only those which are decent, the needful change will soon be wrought. A purified and decided public opinion will compel managers and editors of papers which circulate among the better classes to respect the moralities of life and the laws of behaviour in the homes of the land.-Christian Intelligencer. THE St. Louis Evangelist says: "The pastor of one of our leading churches was absent from his pulpit a Sabbath. Several persons expressed dissatisfaction at seeing a stranger in the pulpit, and one lady said she would not have come if she had known that Dr. going to preach. An elderly lady standing near very promptly replied, Madam, the worship of Dr. be resumed next Sabbath."" was will Which reminds us of a very innocent incident in our own pastorate. Being prevented from attending an evening meeting, we deputed an elder to preside, who began the service by saying, "The pastor is absent to-night; let us sing to his praise the 45th hymn."-New York Observer. ex Aud this reminds us of the cure a certain Scotch minister applied to some illmannered people he met with. On a certain Sunday, Rev. Dr. changed pulpits with Dr. Chalmers. On entering the pulpit he noticed that some quickly left their pews and went out again, and others stood around the door, refusing to be seated. The good man arose and said: "We will not begin the public worship of God till the chaff blows off." At once the remaining people went to their pews and behaved themselves decently. SOME stage-stricken youths seek a manager instead of an elocutionist. Many are in haste to become public speakers and seek the bar or the pulpit, a client or a congregation, instead of a Law School or a Theological Seminary. But even these schools train their students mostly in a one-sided way. They graduate more thorough_scholars than good public speakers. Especially is the beautiful art of good impressive reading much neglected. Even among the best educated ministers of the Gospel there are few who can read a hymn or a passage of Scripture, so as fully to bring out the sense. To no class of men is the art of good reading so important as to the clergy. The best compositions of poetry and prose lose half their beauty and effect by a faulty rendering. A prize of $300 is to be awarded next June to the student in either of the Episcopal Divinity Schools of Cambridge, Philadelphia, Alexandria, Gambier, or Sewanee who is adjudged "the most correct, intelligent, and impressive reader of the Bible and Prayer Book in the service of the church." Will not some one encourage good reading among the theological students of other denominations? It is reported that Mr. Spurgeon will not marry a person of his congregation to one who is not a professor of religion. Possibly his members heed his counsels more than those of some other pastors, who would meet such a refusal with the saucy reply "Well, if you won't, somebody else will." Pastors in some way ought to use their influence against such unequal alliances. What a harvest of curses often flows from them! In some cases the unbelieving one is "sanctified by the believer. In many others the opposite occurs, and both are morally and eternally ruined. "LET all the people praise thee, O Lord, let all the people praise thee." An exchange asks its readers to pray for the singers, more especially for the leaders of song in public worship. A fondness for musical display leads many churches to employ irreligious professional singers, who tickle the ear but fail to touch the heart. God's praise ought to be led by His children. No one else is competent for it. And even among these there is much undevout performing. The same paper says: "In the primitive church the songs of Zion' had a somewhat similar vantageground to that which they now occupy. Chrysostom says, 'The young and old, rich and poor, male and female, bond and free, all join in one song.' Ambrose remarks that 'singing is delightful in early age or period in life and for both sexes.' Hilary testifies, 'In their songs of Zion, both old and young, man and woman, bore a part.' And Jerome writes, 'Go where you will, the ploughman at his plough sings his joyful hallelujahs, the busy mower regales himself with Psalms, and the vine-dresser is singing one of the songs of David. Such are our songs, the solace of the shepherd in his solitude, and the husbandman in his toil.' But at a later period these solemn and spiritual hymns were exchanged for "beathen melodies" which ruled the world for many centuries. To avoid this terrible danger we need to pray very earnestly for the singers." 2 |