I believe he is quite happy,

I remain your's sincerely,
Tunbridge Wells.

To Mrs. Charles E-tt.

M. E.

GRACE, mercy and peace be with thee, Amen. Dear friend, I received your letter this morning with grief and joy; grief at your loss, but joy at the great gain of your dear husband, who I believe is now singing before God and the Lamb. This, my dear friend, is the triumph of faith; the God of all grace was pleased to give him a little hope, and this hope was as an anchor to his soul both sure and stedfast. I read the account with many tears; yea, it hath been this day more to me than my necessary food. Truly may we say, what hath God wrought? The Lord Jesus Christ, of his great love and mercy, hath paid last first; the last, I think, that expected to receive his penny but he is a God that is wonderful in working, and who can say unto him, What doest thou? for " as the heavens are high above the earth, so are his ways above our ways.' He has been pleased to lead the blind in a way that he knew not. He was pleased to take away the natural light, and to give him spiritual, that he might see things out of obscurity. Blessed be his holy name, for his wonderful works to the children of men. This, my, dear friend, is the love that be bears towards all his dear children. Oh that the Lord may be pleased to give you strength equal to your day. You are left in a waste howling wilderness, and I have no doubt but your strength is small but what does the Lord say in his precious word? I will be a Father to the fatherless; and let the widow put her trust in me." will never forsake the afflictions of the afflicted."

I

Go to him, my dear friend, and

tell him all your trouble: intreat of him to strengthen you with all might in your inner man. He will answer thee, when he hears you cry,

"Trust him, he will not deceive you.

Though you hardly of him deem ; He will never, never leave you,

Nor will let you quite leave him." See what he has done for your dear husband. He has been pleased to let him see, and made him feel, and made him tell to us, poor groveling creatures of the earth, what great things there is laid up for them that fear him, to those that hope in his mercy. This, my friend is good news from a far country. This your husband tells you, that all his garments smell of myrrh, aloes, and cassia, out of the ivory palaces. This he had a taste of before he entered the swellings of Jordan. Methinks it is like, as the Saviour said when he raised Lazarus out of the grave," Loose him and let him go:" and then he went to supper with his Lord. And now the angels striking their golden harps at the reception of a poor hobbling worm of the earth, and saying, "Come in thou blessed of the Lord, for thou art worthy;" and he answers them, 'I have no worthiness, for I am altogether unworthy:' but they still say, "Come in, thou blessed of the Lord." His language to you was, Oh, what a mercy, though a rebel. May I ask you, who told him he was a rebel? I say, God the Holy Ghost was teaching him, and leading him to the fountain to wash in, which is open for all them that truly repent; and thus the God of all mercy was pleased to bring him out of a dark place, and led him up to the high mountain, and set his feet upon a rock which is Christ. He told George he should sing like a nightingale. "This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith." And now, my dear friend, he is singing

that song which will never end, "To him that loved us, and washed us in his own blood; to him be everlasting praise. Amen."

And now, I pray God to strengthen you, and comfort you in all your afflictions, and commit you to him, "who is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy." To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen."

I remain your's sincerely,

Sevenoaks.

ROBERT CROWHURST.

A FRAGMENT.

"Without me ye can do nothing." How many of us in this place ever learnt that truth experimentally? How many of us have been brought into the feeling of that very passage so that it has, as it were, grasped the very feelings of our mind, that we have before a heart-searching God been brought to say, Lord, without thee I can neither pray nor believe, I can neither hope nor persevere, neither watch nor wait; without thee I cannot save my sinking soul from falling into everlasting ruin.

The World in the Church of the Present Day. By a Watchman. 12mo. pp: 68. London Simpkin & Co.

In a day like the present, when the world generally assume the garb of outward profession, and counterfeit the character of disciples of Christ; it is difficult indeed to distinguish the possessing church from those who are only hypocrites in Zion: and thus when we are exclaiming against the too great assimilation existing between the church and the world, it may be in fact, that we are only pointing our arrows against those who still being of the world and worldly, have no other connection with the church and the name of Christ, than the vain and empty profession which they have themselves assumed. It might be matter of serious consideration as to our duty respecting these, had not our Lord left it upon record, Let them grow together uuto the harvest and he who busies himself only in unmasking, as he terms it, hypocrites in the church, sets himself to an employment to which he was never

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called, and for which he will never receive thanks. The minister's commission is to preach the gospel; and that message, applied by the Spirit of Christ, will, by being in itself a savour of life unto life or of death unto death, be the best and only effectual means of separating the precious from the vile, and will cause the speaker indeed to be as God's mouth.

Notwithstanding what we thus assert, that the many professed christians, who are by this author and others deemed to derogate from their religious character, by mingling too much with the world, are, in our opinion, many of them, professors only; and notwithstanding our opinion, that it belongs not to man to take upon himself to unmask hypocrites, and to decide upon the eternal state of his brethren; it must still be allowed, that this fraternity of the world with the church, this outward prosperity of religion, and consequent mingling of religionists with the godly in our day, is a snare which may, and doubtless does lead many

of the true disciples of our Lord, into an assimilation with the world and the things of the world, the reIsult of which is a leanness in their

souls, and a barrenness of spiritual enjoyments.

This little book is intended to warn such of their danger, to point out to them their transgression, and to encourage them in turning back again from these empty cisterns which hold no water. So far as this is done consistently with the word of the Lord, we approve of it, and recommend it to the attention of our readers.

The Precious Jewels of the Church Rescued from the hands of Spoilers. 13th Part. By C. Drawbridge. 12mo. pp. 12. Wellingborough, Westbrook; London, Palmer.

MR. Drawbridge we perceive progresses with this series, which in its early numbers we strongly recommended. In this number, which take up as before some scriptures of apparent difficulty, we cannot say that we saw any thing particularly adapted to remove it in the author's explanation. There is too much vain show of learning, and in some places too much sophistry, to justify our continuation of that commendation which the earlier and more simple numbers merited and received.

Baptismal Regeneration, in its Evil Consequences. By John Cox. 12mo. pp. 12. Woolwich: Black.

We have often thought, that whatever may be the evil consequences of Baptismal Regeneration, being alas, too manifestly the doctrine ad literatim of the Church of England; one consequence undoubtedly has been, that the recoil from so unscriptural a sentiment, sends many hastily to embrace adult baptism, who, but for this error, would never have gone so far as to exclude infants altogether.

ed but very disgraceful Songs. We only wonder that he was not ashamed to put his name to such ribaldry. They have called forth replies exposing in similar style of composition his bigotry and his folly. We do not recommend any of them, but where the bane is spreading it will be well to scatter likewise the antidote.

Popery Demonstrated to be a Perfect Contrast to the Religion of Jesus Christ: a Sermon preached at Clap. ham, Surry, by the late Rev. H. Venn, A.M. 12mo. pp. 48. London: Elt.

THIS Sermon, which was preached in Clapham church on the 5th of November, 1758, by Mr. Venn, the rector, has been republished by Mr. R. Stodhart, formerly of the chapel in Pell Street, Ratcliffe Highway; and he has prefixed thereto a preface which fills twenty-three pages, and contains some useful observations in defence of the protestant cause, against the inroads made by papists and their subtle though not avowed friends the Oxford Tractarians.

The Sermon is a very meagre discourse on James iii. 17, in which Mr. V. calls the attention of his hearers, 1. To the origin of christianity, and the tempers which constitute its supreme excellence: and, 2. Contrasts them with the origin, tenets and spirit of popery. Though the Sermon has little to recommend, the preface may be read with approbation.

What David did: a Reply to the Queen's Letter. By Rev. Thomas Spencer. 12mo. pp. 16. London: Green.

THE Queen, as some of our readers may know, issued, at the end of the last year, a Circular Letter, authorizing a collection to be made in behalf of the Society for Promoting the Building of Churches, and Mr. Spencer in this Tract supplies his reasons

"Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him? how he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shew-bread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for

them that were with him, but only for the priests." This act of David, Mr. Spencer brings forward as ample authority for Her Majesty's Ministers to appropriate the property of the Church to destroy for ever an equivalent portion of the national debt, and to diminish the annual taxation of the country to that extent."

Dissenters as we are, we unhesitatingly assert, that in our opinion, such an act of any Minister, or of any Parliament, would be as much an act of robbery, as though Parliament

were to seize on the revenue of the rich city companies, or of hospitals, or of dissenting chapel endowments. If property has been given or bequeathed, no matter whether foolishly or not, to a specific body-and the Church of England is as much so as the Merchant Tailors' Company-no government can justly take it away from either of them. Let them legislate for its wiser, and more proportionate, and more beneficial distribution, but let it always be devoted to its own purposes; and should ever the day arrive that a destructive Parliament shall attain power sufficient to seize and appropriate otherwise the revenues of the Established Church, it will be but the beginning of a movement which will proceed to rob with impunity every other institution of the State, and overthrow the whole fabric of society.

It must not be thought from this, that we consider the inordinate wealth of the Church of England a benefit to it, or a means of its greater usefulness: on the contrary, it is certain that this lures within its priesthood,

men in every respect base, but, vast as is its property, if distributed more proportionately, this temptation might be lessened, and its usefulness, in a moral point of view, thereby increased. This, however, is a subject for legislators, into which we do not further enter.

One word to the author. If he so much disapprove of the Church Establishment, why not become a dissenter? There are some dissenters, certainly, to whom it is choice food to hear a clergyman abuse the National Church, but those whose good opinion is worth seeking, will but lightly esteem a bird addicted to soil its own nest.

A Scriptural Defence of Baptism as Practised by those Christians called Independents. By Thomas Willett. 18mo. pp. 16. London: Berger.

WATER baptism is a subject upon which the Spiritual Magazine is silent: amongst those who know us, our own opinion is never withheld, nor that Scripture authority which satisfies us that therein we are following the mind of Christ: but as discussion upon it turns it so often into the waters of strife, that it was determined, and perhaps wisely so, that this work should be retained free therefrom.

Our business here, therefore, with this little pamphlet, is simply to announce it, which we do accordingly.

Brief Thoughts on the Things of God and the Soul, in Words of one Syllable, By Edward Dalton. 18mo. pp. 103. London: Wright & Co.

THE peculiar feature of this little book is, that it is written exclusively in words of one syllable, and in so far is no doubt better adapted for circulation amongst the uneducated. This distinguishing characteristic, necessarily cramps the author's ideas, and his evident ability of writing

much more and much better on the subjects taken in hand. A short extract will shew the author's style, and enable our readers to form their own opinion of the work.

Faith, too, is a great gift of God. What would Christ be to us if we had not faith? Why, what the sun is to a blind man, what sweet sounds are to a deaf man, what food is to a dead man. We could not pray, we could not praise, we could not stir one step in the right way, if we had not faith. He that doubts in his heart while he prays, tempts God, for he doubts the love and grace of God, and is like a blind man who gropes for the wall. All that is not of faith is sin; and to pray with no faith in the heart, is to mock God with our tougue. Our lips may move well, but the heart will not move if we have no faith-for faith is the wing of the heart to make it rise to God. Faith is the arm we stretch out to lean on Christ. Faith is the hand by which we take hold of him and all his gifts. Let us bless God, then, that we have such great gifts from him that life is ours; that health is ours; that we have a mind to think, and a soul to love and live with God; that faith is ours; that Christ is ours: and let us live as those who know what great gifts of God these are."

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