The hearers have not the capacity to attend to it, to understand it, to be impressed by it. Considering the future station of his pupils in life, the hardships they must suffer, and the labour they must undergo; he would have them trained to contentment, patience, humility. Industrious and frugal, sober and moderate, faithful and obedient, they should be fitted to become useful servants, good husbands, and careful masters of a family. And, that they may be thus educated, he would wish them to be influenced by the noblest and most powerful principles which can sway the human breast:-the sense of duty, the fear of God, the desire of pleasing him, the dread of sin, indifference to this world, and lively hope of a future better state. Such would, probably, be the character which your correspondent would draw in his mind. Let him then chuse his plan of education with a direct reference to the formation of each distinct part of such a character. It will be necessary to analize it, and to take the parts, of which it is composed, separately, that each may be duly considered. In this analysis the four following objects, correspondent to the principal springs of action in man, will chiefly claim attention, the enlarge. ment of the mind, the improvement of the habits, the regulation of the tempers, and the reformation of the principles, by the powerful influence of religion. The consideration of these points, however, must be delayed till another opportunity, as I have already somewhat exceeded the usual limits of an essay. MISCELLANEOUS. (To be continued.] N. D. To the Editor of the Christian Observer. I AM puzzled beyond expression; and as I have no means of solving my difficulties at home, I venture to apply to you. I have long been a regular attendant at my church, and thought I was well acquainted with every thing which a good christian need wish to know. I took pains also to train up my children in the same paths which I had trod before; and so successful were my endeavours, that they presently were able to state the principal evidences of christianity, almost as well as the rector himself. But you must know, Sir, that my eldest daughter is somewhat of an inquisitive disposition; and one Sunday night, when I was repeating the substance of the afternoon sermon, which was intended to obviate the objections of Mr. Hume against the christian miracles, she quite astonished me by the following enquiry "Pray, mamma, what is the nature and object of christianity? It is surrounded with a wonderful variety of evidence, the force of which I feel and acknowledge: surely the nature of the gospel itself, which is recommended by such a display of dignity and Now here began my first difficulty on power, must be very surprising." the subject. I could have written a volume upon the evidences, but had never employed a single thought upon a question like this: so I resolved" to go to the rector. He was very civil to me, but blamed Harriet exceedingly for troubling her head with things which she could not understand; and desired me to tell her that the christian religion alone had discovered to us a future state, and established the existence of one God. Now all this he had told us often before; for, in fact, these discoveries themselves, when duly considered, form no trifling argument in favour of that revelation, which first clearly and unequivocally proclaimed them to the world. But this answer satisfied neither my daughter nor myself. I do not know whether the rector meant any allusion to Harriet in the sermon, which he delivered on the following Sunday; but, if he did, he certainly failed of his object. His text was, "Sec. et things belong unto the Lord our God," and he warned us against indulging a profane curiosity in divine things. I thought his text was a little against us; but on referring to the passage, when we got home, our desire of information was rather excited than allayed: for it appeared that some things are revealed which belong to us and to our children; and we both agreed that it was of importance to learn them. To settle all my doubts at once, I ventured to make an application to a Cambridge scholar, who happened at that time to be resident in the neighbourhood. For the better discussion of the subject he came to drink tea with us, and, as his memory is good, he gave us the substance of several sermons which he had lately heard. I was much obliged by his civility; but really, Sir, I was never the wiser. One gentleman proved, it seems, that the ancient heathens had no hospitals or infirmaries, and that many of their barbarous customs exist no longer: these are collateral benefits beyond a doubt; but they can hardly constitute the essence of christianity. Another preacher had overthrown the oracle at Delphi, and demonstrated that his objections had no force when applied to the prophecies of scripture. This, as you will plainly perceive, was little to our purpose. Nor did we make much progress in the cause by elaborate dissertations against the impostor of Mecca; for my family, I sincerely believe, are just as likely to embrace the religion of the Hindoos as the doctrines of Mahomet. But perhaps there are some Mahometans at Cambridge; and, if so, the eloquence of the preacher, I hope, has produced its effect. Such, Sir, was the substance of our conversation for at least two hours. The patience of my daughter was at length exhausted, and she earnestly inquired whether it was not sometimes the custom to illustrate the doctrines of the gospel, and requested all the information on that head which he had time to communicate. He readily undertook the task, and gave us many satisfactory proofs of the existence of the Supreme Being, the reality of dæmoniacal agency as stated in the gospels, and the personality of the great enemy of man. I will not exhaust your patience, Mr. Editor, by entering into a longer detail; the conclusion of the business was, that my young guest recommended me to apply to you-" I have discovered," said he on leaving us, "what I did not before suspect, that my own CHRIST. OBSERV, No. 33. creed is defective; the knowledge which I now possess is not able to make me wise unto salvation, and I am much afraid, that many of the clergy, in dwelling exclusively on the evidences of christianity, or demonstrating acknowledged truths, forget to state the essential doctrines of the gospel. On my return to college, if it please the Almighty to spare my life, I will hear with greater attention and examine with greater accuracy; and if you will permit the cor respondence, I will lay before you the result of my enquiries." If you wish to see his letter, when it arrives I will certainly send it. In the mean time, Sir, I hope you will not forget my poor Harriet, nor her affectionate mo ther, MARGARET JOHNSON. To the Editor of the Christian Observer. THE account of the remarkable council held by the Jews in the plain of Ageda in Hungary, as far as I can learn, rests entirely upon the testimony of Samuel Brett, who was present at the assembly, and drew up the narrative contained in the Pho nix. The authors of the modern Universal History, Vol. XI. pp. 141143, last edition, admit the account as authentic, but confirm it by no additional evidence. Its authenticity has, indeed, been attacked by the learned, but capricious, Jortin. His objections, however, do not appear to possess much force. His first ar gument is, that the authors of the Acta Eruditorum declared their sus picions concerning it. These critics, however, allege nothing but the silence of Basnage for their opinion. Basnage, it is true, is silent upon the subject, when the very nature of his work, a history of the Jews to the age in which he wrote, required that he should adduce, or formally confute, so extraordinary and interesting a narration, unless he were ignorant of it. And his silence, under such circumstances, is a much stronger proof of this ignorance than of his rejection of the piece in question. The other argument of Jortin is the assertion of Manasseh Ben Israel, in his Defence of the Jews, contained in the second volume of the Phoenix, epressly contradicting the whole story. But those who consider the prejudices 4 B that would operate in the mind of a Jew upon such a subject, and the grounds upon which persons of that nation sometimes make their assertions, will pay as little deference to the second argument of Jortin as to the first. See Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, Vol. II. pp. 419, 420. second edition. I think, therefore, with Whitaker, that "this narrative, though branded as fabulous by a cotemporary Jew in Phoenix ii. 401," and, I may add, by a Christian, Rem. Ecc. Hist. carries all the marks of authenticity with it; and is very curious." Origin of Arianism, p. 9, note. 66 .מ To the Editor of the Christian Observer. THE following verses were composed by the ever-memorable Sir Henry Wotton, provost of Eton College, and ambassador from James the First to the State of Venice. They were written during his illness, and not being contained in the common edition of Walton's Lives, nor in the Reliquia Wottonianæ, may not be unacceptable to those of your readers who can taste the beautiful and pathetic simplicity of the composition, without being offended with the quaintness of some of the expressions. G. S. O thou great Power, in whom I move, No rags of saints, no purging fire, Was worlds of seas to quench thine ire. O, precious ransom! which, once paid, That consummatum est, was said; And said by him that said no more, But seal'd it with his dying breath. Thou then that hast dispuug'd my store, And dying wast the death of Death, Be to me now, on thee I call, My life, my strength, my joy, any all. FRAGMENTS. LINES OF SIR WILLIAM JONES. The following beautiful tetrastick is a literal translation from the Persian by Sir William Jones. AN ATHENIAN ANECDOTE. Some sycophants of the Romans, then their masters, proposed to the Athenians, in a public assembly, to imitate their lords in the exhibition of shews of prize-fighters and gladiators in their theatres. A worthy citizen, who was present, affected to applaud the flattering measure, and requested his fellow-citizens only first to accompany him, and help him to throw down the altar, which, in their better times, they had erected to MERCY. That sensible people felt immediately the grave rebuke, and were the only state in Greece that had courage to forbear imitating the barbarity of their conquerors. Ought not a British Legislator to feel that, while he continues to legalize the enormities of the slave trade, he is bound in consistency to abjure christianity? WEST INDIAN ANECDOTE. The Reverend James Ramsay, a writer of the first authority, in his Essay on the Treatment and Conversion of African Slaves, published in 1784, before any idea was entertained of a parliamentary inquiry, relates that, in one of our colonies, "No less than two chief judges, within these thirty years, have been celebrated for cutting off, or mashing so as to make amputation necessary, the limbs of their slaves. In one case, a surgeon was called in to operate; but he answered, he was not obliged to be the instrument of another man's cruelty. His Honour had it then performed by a cooper's adze, and the wretch was left to bleed to death, without attention or dressing. When he became convulsed in the agonies of death, the surgeon was agam hastily sent for, and came in time to pronounce him dead. People stared at the recital, but made no enquiry for blood. In the other case, the limb was mashed with a sledge hammer, and then it was amputated by a surgeon, and the maimed wretch lived soine years." ANECDOTE OF THE SLAVE TBADE. In the month of March, 1733, the following circumstances came out in the trial of a case of insurance, before the chief justice of the Court of King's Bench, at Guildhall. An ignorant master of a slave ship had overshot his port, Jamaica, and was afraid of wanting water before he could beat up again to the island. He himself fell sick. In the course of his illness, he ordered his mate, who was the man that gave the evidence, to throw overboard 46 slaves, handcuffed; and he was readily obeyed. Two days after he ordered 36 more to be thrown after them, and after two days more another parcel of 40. Ten others, who had been permitted to take the air on deck, unfettered, jumped into the sea indignantly after them. The ship, after all, brought into port 480 gallons of water. Will any one pretend that it can be right, in any possible circumstances, to submit the fate of such numbers of reasonable creatures to the reveries of a sick monster? Or will it be believed that his brutal instrument should dare to boast of his obedience, as he actually did with impunity, in the highest criminal court of the best informed people of Europe? ADVERTISEMENT COPIED FROM A CHARLES- "Stop the runaway! Fifty dollars reward! Whereas my waiting-fellow, Will, having eloped from me last Saturday, without any provocation, it being known that I am a humane master, the above reward will be paid to any one who will lodge the aforesaid slave in some jail, or deliver him to me on my plantation at Liberty Hall. Will may be known by the cisions of the whip on his back; and I suspect him to have taken the road Davis's Travels in America from 1798 to 1802, p. 90. AMERICAN SLAVERY. "The children of the most distinguished families in Carolina are suckled by negro women. It is not unusual to hear an elegant lady sav, Richard always grieves when Quasheba is whipped, because she suckled kim."-Davis's Travels, p. 86. "The ladies of Carolina, and particularly those of Charlestown, have little tenderness for their slaves; on the contrary, they send both their men slaves and women slaves, for the most venial trespass, to a horrid mansion called the sugar-house. Here a man employs inferior agents to scourge the poor negroes. A shilling for a dozen lashes is the charge. The man waist: a redoubtable whip at every or woman is stripped naked to the lash flays the back of the culprit, who, agonized at every pore, rends the air with his cries. Mrs. D informed me that a lady of Charlestown once observed to her, that she thought it abominably dear to pay a shilling for a dozen lashes, and that, having many slaves, she would bargain with the by the year." Ib. p.:90. man at the sugar-house to flog them "These wretches are execrated for endure execration, without emotion, every involuntary offence: but negroes for they say, when massa curse he break no bone. But every master does not confine himself to oaths. heard a man say, 'My negroes talk the I have worst English of any in Carolina: that boy just now called a bason, a round something: take him to the driver! let him have a dozen!' "Exposed to such wanton cruelty the negroes frequently runaway: they flee into the woods, where they are wet with the rains of heaven, and embrace the rock for want of a shelter. Life must be supported: hunger incites to depredation, and the poor wretches are often shot like the beasts of prey. When taken, the men are put in irons, and the boys have their necks encircled with a pot-hook." Ib. p. 92. Yet, under such treatment, slaves in America multiply so rapidly as to double their numbers in 25 years. What must the treatment in the West Indies be,where, according to the state ments of the planters themselves, the births cannot supply the wasted po pulation? REVIEW OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. THE first two works in the controversy, occasioned by Mr. Marsh's extraordinary Hypothesis concerning the Origin and Composition of our Three First Canonical Gospels, were reviewed in our volume for 1802, pp. 727 -730. The remarks which we then made we think applicable to the continuation of the controversy, in the publications of which we now propose to give some account. Our account, however, will be but short and general; for such is the fate of most controversies, and of this among the rest, that little is added to the argument but unseemly personalities, and mutual misrepresentations, explanations, and recriminations. By these the argument is little assisted, and the reader little entertained: but the blame lies with the original offender, who, in the present case, justice o bliges us to say, evidently appears to be the author of the hypothesis in question. To an attentive and impartial reader of this controversy we think it will appear, that as far as a comprehensive and accurate knowledge of the hypothesis excogitated by Mr. Marsh, and the solvibility of the evangelie phenomena by that hypothesis, that is, as far as a certain kind and degree of internal evidence upon the subject is concerned, the advantage is de cidedly on the side of Mr. Marsh. But to a reader of the same description we think it will be equally manifest, that the external evidence, which relates to the question at issue, is as decidedly in favour of Mr. Marsh's opponent. It remains then to be determined of what nature this question is; for upon such a determination must, in a great measure, depend the applicability and effect of the evidence adduced. Now it can, upon no pretence, be denied, that the origin of any writings, and therefore of the gospels under consideration, is purely an historical fact, and to be ascertained by the same evidence, (if it exist, or can be procured,) upon which any other historical fact is established. It is by external evidence, therefore, that the truth of the hypothesis in question, (not the truth of that hypothesis as solving the existing phenomena, which is a very different thing from its truth in fact, although Mr. Marsh frequently confounds the two), must be determined; and it would be a violation of all the rules of just argumentation to resort to any other, much more to prefer any other when this is to be obtained. The external evidence, or the evidence of history, opposes the hy; pothesis of Mr. Marsh as directly and decidedly as, in a case of such a nature, can easily be conceived. The negative part of this evidence, that is, the entire silence of ecclesiastical antiquity respecting any such original document, &c. &c., as the hypothe |