TRUE COURAGE.-"Should the Empress," says Chrysostom, in his epistle to Cyriocus, "determine to banish me, the earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof." If she will cast me into the sea, let her cast me into the sea, I will remember Jonah. If she will throw me into a burning fiery furnace, the three children were there be fore me. If she will throw me to the wild beasts, I will remember that Daniel was in the den of lions. If she will condemn me to be stoned, I shall be the associate of Stephen the proto-martyr. If she will have me beheaded, the Baptist has submitted to the same punishment. If she will take away my substance, 'naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither.""

THE WAY TO BE HAPPY.

Some think it is a hardship to work for their bread
Although for our good it was meant;

But those who don't work have no right to be fed,
And the idle are never content.

An honest employment gives pleasure and gain,
And makes us our troubles forget;

For those who work hard have no time to complain.
And 'tis better to labour than fret.

And if we had riches they could not procure

A happy and peaceable mind;

Rich people have troubles as well as the poor,
Although of a different kind.

It signifies not what our stations have been,
Nor whether we're little or great;
For happiness lies in the temper within,
And not in the outward estate.

We need only labour as hard as we can,
For all that our bodies may need;
Still doing our duty to God and to man,
And we shall be happy indeed.

A SISTER'S DEATH.

She died upon a winter's night,

A long, long time ago;

When the large round moon had a wintry look,
As it shone on the breast of the frozen brook,
And over the fields of snow.

As she lay that night in the pale moonlight,
Which fell on her peaceful bed,

She seemed like the form of a sculptured saint,
Without sign of woe or of mortal taint,

With a glory around her head.

With her eyelids closed and her lips apart,
And her arms like the marble fair,
Crossed on her bosom, and gently pressed,
She lay, as she sank to her peaceful rest,
In the mute repose of prayer.

When the morning broke, and we gazed again,
A smile to her face seemed given;

And though our spirits were crushed and sad,
The Christmas bells soon made us glad,

For we knew she woke in heaven.

UNIV. OF CALIFORNIA

THE

PRESBYTERIAN MAGAZINE.

MAY, 1852.

Miscellaneous Articles.

A "TRUE-BLUE PRESBYTERIAN."

A "TRUE-BLUE Presbyterian" is an enlightened, true-hearted son of a Church that aims at pursuing the "chief end of man," according to the Scriptures.

Let us glance at the origin of this homespun word—often a term of reproach-but, like the banner of Caledonia, significant of strength and loyalty.

The term seems to be suggested by some part of the dress which was of blue; and some say that, after the fashion of other Presbyterian things, it is taken from the Scriptures. "Did you ever hear of such a word in the Bible?" exclaimed with glee master Charles, who had learned a good deal in the Scriptures, at home and in the parochial school. "Stop a minute," said I, "my young scholar, and bring me the family Bible. Now turn to Numbers, 15th chapter and 38th verse.' The boy, with some amazement, read as follows: "Speak unto the children of Israel, and bid them that they make them fringes in the borders of their garments throughout their generations, and that they put upon the fringe of the borders a riband of blue. And it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments of the Lord, and do them." "Well," said Charles, "I always knew that Presbyterians tried to do the commandments of the Lord, but I never thought of this blue before!"

Another theory is, that the Scotch Covenanters assumed blue ribbons as their colours, and wore them as scarfs, or in their bonnets, in opposition to the scarlet badge of Charles I. Other antiquarians trace the Scotch blue up to the aboriginal races on the island of Great Britain. Cæsar thus describes the Britons of his day: "All the Britons dye themselves with woad, which produces a cerulean or VOL. II.-No. 5

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blue colour." (Lib. v. 14, de B. G.) Other inquirers satisfy themselves with the fact that blue predominates in the tartans of the most ancient and gallant clans, while it enters as a constituent colour more or less into all. Hence, "true blue" became symbolic of Scotch patriotism and national renown.

"It's guid to be upright and wise,

It's guid to be honest and true,

It's guid to support Caledonia's cause,

And bide by the bonnets o' blue."

Without entering deeper into the origin of our clannish blue, (the reproach of which colour, by the bye, tinges the vesture of our Congregational brethren, whose far-famed legislation was scandalized with blue-laws,*) we will content ourselves with assuming that blue characterized the Scotch tartan from time immemorial, like red the dress of the Southern Englishers, and that in the civil wars of the seventeenth century, "a true-blue Presbyterian" was synonymous with a Scotchman who fought for liberty and his Church.

What is the meaning of the word now-a-days? That, dear reader, we shall explain very briefly, and in its truest sense. The word has some definite meaning at our hearth-stones, and in our school-houses and churches.

1. A true-blue Presbyterian is a Christian who loves the old fashioned Bible doctrines in the Confession of Faith. He lays much stress on God's sovereignty and the doctrines of grace. All Presbyterians do not thus magnify revealed truth; this characteristic more properly belongs to the "true-blue.” The word of God, in its simple, spiritual meaning, as explained in the Confession of Faith, not for "substance of doctrine," but for true doctrine, is dear to the heart of a thorough Presbyterian. Though Infidels blaspheme, and Arminians deride, and Papists mystify, the doctrine of election, it stands forth in the prominence of heaven-towering sublimity in the vision of the Christian we are describing. "You need not quote Paul," said an infidel, combating the doctrine of election, "Paul was a Presbyterian." The fathers across the waters, with Calvin and Knox at their head, were thorough believers in all the distinctive doctrines of grace. So were our own great ancestors, Makemie, the Tennents, Dickinson, and Davies. "As to our doctrines," replied Francis Makemie, when arraigned by the High-church Governor of New York, in 1707, "we have our Confession of Faith, which is known to the Christian world." In that compend of Bible truth the real Presbyterian believes, as containing the best human interpretation of the Divine will.

2. He is also a strict friend of the Sabbath and of divine ordinances. A Scotch Sabbath is purgatory to a worldling. But the Lord's day is a day of sober meditation and of spiritual delight to those who have faith in Divine teachings. Sobriety and joy are not inconsistent terms. May-poles, feasting, and dancing, which agreed with the taste of King Charles's Christians, were the horror of those

\*We mean, of course, according to their High-church enemies.