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Music is by some severe sects, and especially the Quakers, rejected as an aid to devotion, being accounted harmful and of a tendency to divert the attention from "thoughts of God and things divine." What its effect may be on those who study it as an art, and who are critics therein, we know not, but to us a "concord of sweet sounds" is always what Collins calls "soul-subduing," even when

"The sun is in the Heavens and the proud day

Attended with the pleasures of the world."

Still more does its benign influence pervade our senses, and abstract them from the grosser apprehensions of our fallen nature, when in the twilight hour we reverently tread the pavement of some ancient structure devoted to religious uses

"Where through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault

The pealing anthem swells the note of praise."

The venerable cloisters, with their sculptured mementoes of the transitive nature of our sojourn here, impress us with devotional feelings: but the deep tones of the organ fill the mind with holy thoughts, like a voice from another world; and as its solemn sounds float away to a softer strain, we seem to hear an angel's whisper in the dying cadences of the distant chant!

If this subject were taken up by those competent to agitate and to promote it, they might count on us to become a member of the first church that should be opened as a temple of God on the plan we have suggested. With one more extract, we conclude our notice of "Notes at Paris :"

"The following startling language has been used by a distinguished writer, who has been received in the present year, with marked favor, by the Pope :-' Pour moi ce que je regrette, je l'avoue franchement, c'est qu'on n'ait pas brulé Jean Hus plus tôt, et qu'on n'ait pas brulé également Luther; c'est qu'il ne soit pas trouvé quelque prince assez pieux, et assez politique, pour mouvoir une croisade coutre les Protestants!'"

Thus we see that the spirit of Popery remains the same, and it confesses itself ready, with an outspoken candour truly edifying, to perpetrate another St. Bartholomew, on a grander scale, if only it can find a prince sufficiently pious to undertake the crusade.

"The Great Eclipse" would have pleased us better if its title had been some guide to its contents. It is only explained by exhibiting the attempts of the Roman Catholics and Tractarians to eclipse the "Sun of Righteousness," which, after all, is not eclipsed.

We took up the book expecting to be edified on the subject of astrology, instead of which, we found a collection of Popish and Tractarian

edicts and confessions of faith contrasted with Bible texts and the precepts of Christianity.

The one decree of "The Council of Trent" (the great RomanCatholic rule of Faith) which renders controversy useless is this-All saving truth is not contained in the Holy Scriptures.

Now if my father has promised me, on going into a far country, in a letter which he has transmitted to me by his faithful servants, that if I comply with the conditions therein set down, he will, on his return, give me an inheritance, and that I must listen to no instructions as from him but what are included in that letter, should I not be accounted worse than a Heathen if I foolishly listened to those who would persuade me that all my father's mind was not in that letter, and that he would not give me the inheritance unless I followed their advice, which was contrary to this letter, and which, if it were true, would prove my father to be a liar? That he intended to deceive me and not to give me any inheritance at all? My only chance is clearly to abide by what he himself enjoined me. Upon the observance of his word I can expect the promised recompense; but will he hear me if I tell him that I was persuaded that he would not reward me if I did not disobey his injunctions, and therefore that I have disobeyed them?

If Popery does not rest on Scripture it rests on nothing, and it is an insult to the human understanding to pretend otherwise.

The religion of Christ teaches faith, love, and charity-that of the Pope inculcates falsehood, hatred, and vengeance. We have, therefore, no common ground of argument with it, because our objections to it are ab initio. It would be like arguing with a bastard who claims to be the rightful heir by repudiating his father, in whose name alone he could have any title at all. If it were a Church which proclaimed the Bible, inculcated charity and humility, protected liberty of conscience, and denounced the shedding of blood, it would then at least have something to recommend it to the consideration of Christians; but from its past and present history it can only be proved to be an abomination, and a scourge to the human race.

The Tractarians seem to be envious of the power possessed by Roman-Catholic priests over the minds of their flocks, and evidently turn a longing eye to Rome.

"Your trumpery principles about Scripture being the sole rule in fundamentals, I nauseate the word," says Froude, vol. 1, p. 413.

"All ideas of the Bible and the dispensing of the Bible, as in itself a means of propagating Christianity,, are a fiction and an absurdity," says the Reverend Mr. Bennett.

This appears to us to be language which might be pardoned in a Turk-hardly in one professing to be a Christian; but we object not to it on our own account. Any Church which does not persecute, and which distributes the Bible, may preach against it as much as it likes; nobody is obliged to listen to its preachers, and those who choose to do so, with the Bible in their hands, are not accountable to us.

The writer of the "Great Eclipse" has succeeded in exhibiting the evil doctrines and practices of Popery in a strong and repulsive light, and in the latter part of the volume are some descriptions, by sufferers, and by Dr. Geddes, Bishop Wilcox, and other credible witnesses, of tortures inflicted by the Inquisition, and at Autos da fé, which make the very flesh creep only to read them.

"The Tuscan martyrs," whose case is so well known, we only allude to here for the purpose of offering our tribute of respect to their spirited advocate, M. Maggiorani, whose bold and eloquent defence of the Madiai was not only highly honorable to himself, but must in our opinion do more damage to the cause of the Pope and his friend the Grand Duke than all the private reading of the Scriptures previously throughout their dominions. It is something, too, in favor of the progress of truth that such an appeal was, in such a tribunal, suffered to proceed without interruption, and to obtain publicity.

It is to be lamented that England, the land of religious and political freedom, and the liberator in past times of the human mind from the thraldom of priestcraft, does so little even at this day to assist Christianity on the continent. Our Government might make it the interest of these petty despots to behave better.

But we must take care we do not fall into the error of Bishop Hall, who wrote a treatise on "Moderation," towards the end of which he makes this extraordinary observation, "Master Calvin did well approve himself to God's Church in bringing Servetus to the stake at Geneva"!! Will Polemics be always implacable?

This little book gives all the particulars of the case of the Madiai, from the period of their arrest to the conclusion of their imprisonment, and teaches an impressive lesson of Roman-Catholic power.

THE SWISS MOTHER.

BY J. L. A.

Awake! awake! my child, my own-my hunter-boy, arise,
The dawn breaks o'er the distant hills, the lark is in the skies;
The chamois climbs the mountain height, and on the dewy slope,
Free as thy footstep, and as light, bounds the young antelope;

And the hunter's horn sounds on the hills, where the echoes answer make,
And yet thou sleepest heavily; my child, my own, awake!

A radiant smile is on thy brow; what doth thy spirit dream?

Is it of some sequester'd dell, with its unsunn'd mountain stream—
Where thou hast laid thee down to rest upon the flowery brink,

Or stoop'd to cool thy burning brow, or the freshening wave to drink ?——
Or, perchance, thou'st bent thy woodland bow, & mark'd thine arrow's flight,
And joyous art, for the goodly prey thou wilt bear me home to night.

How fast has slumber seal'd thine eyes! thou, that wert wont to spring,
Like a young eagle from the rock, ere the lark had spread her wing :
And yet thou liest there, although the light falls on thee now,
The glorious light of Heaven's own sun upon thy cheek and brow;
Thou liest there, still, in thy calm, thy all unwonted sleep,

So fair, and yet so motionless; and I,—why do I weep?

I had a fearful dream of thee: oh! was it all a dream?

The horrors of that wild abyss, with its deep unfathom'd stream;
With the lonely bittern's boding scream, above its rocky bed,

And the hollow waters' gurgling sound, as they closed above thine head;
And thy bright locks soil'd with tangled weeds, and thy pallid lips apart;-
Alas! for such deep dreams of woe, to load a mother's heart!

It was an idle vision all: thou wilt awaken soon,

And ask me for the cooling grapes, to quench thy thirst at noon;
Wilt sling thy bow upon thine arm, and try thy pointed dart,
And linger for thy mother's smile and kiss, ere thou depart;
Then bound along the mountain path, while the echoes will rejoice,
To learn the gladsome notes thou sing'st, and bear me back thy voice.

HH

Thy precious voice, that can unlock the depths of my sad heart,
Calling back dreams of one more dear, all precious as thou art:
Till, like a flower that bowed its head beneath the tempest's wrath,
I raise my hopes while joy and peace seem bright'ning round my path:
But soon amidst the distant wilds I lose thy joyous tone,

And wake, to find myself once more, a widow-and alone.

A sunbeam yet more deeply priz'd for breaking through a cloud;
A staff to rest a weary frame, by age and sorrow bow'd;

A green tree in the wilderness; alone, amidst the sand,

A sparkling fount of gushing streams in a dry and thirsty land;
A star to guide a lonely bark on a dark and troubled sea;—
Thou hast been all of these, my child, aye, more than these to me.

But soft, thou wak'st:-thou wak'st; once more those joyous eyes unclose,
Flashing with light as proud as that the diamond's lustre throws:
Oh! precious to thy mother's heart, too tenderly endear'd,

I knew thou held'st an idol's place, and therefore have I fear'd;
I fear'd that He, who claims the heart of man to be his own,
Should strike the rival from his throne and leave me here alone.

But joy for my more blessed lot; again the hope I see
The vision'd scene that calls thee forth, a leader of the free;
That hangs around thy noble brow a halo of such light,
The proudest diadem of earth hath glory none so bright:

I hear the voice of prayer ascend, of praise from every shrine,

And the name for which those vows are breathed, my precious child, is thine.

Oh! chide ye not the mother's dream, she hath a prophet's eye;
She hears the voice of coming years, the time that draweth nigh;
She holds a gem of richest price; she feels its unknown worth,
She sees him marked for glorious deeds,—a hero from his birth:
And high the throbs of generous pride within her bosom swell,
For she waits till Alp to Alp shall bear the name of-WILLIAM TELL.

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