b

With well-doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men: as free, and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness, but as the servants of Göd.— I. PETER, ii. 15, 16.

LORD, MAKE US FREE.

ORD, when heavenly dews distil,
When my hopes are bright and clear,
When I sit on Zion's hill,

Temper joy with holy fear;

Keep me watchful,

Safe alone when Thou art near.

When a tempting world in view
Gains upon my yielding heart,

When its pleasures I pursue,
Then a look of pity dart;
Teach me pleasures

Which the world can ne'er impart.

When the vale of death appears,
Faint and cold this mortal clay,
Clear my doubts, allay my fears,
Light me through the dreary way;
Chase the shadows,

Usher in eternal day.

REFLECTIONS.

Jane Taylor.

MEN are apt to think that they who are in the highest
places, and have the most power, have most liberty to
say
and do what they please: but it is quite otherwise; for they
have the least liberty, because they are most observed.-ARCH-
BISHOP TILLOTSON.

Better is little with the fear of the Lord, than great treasure and trouble therewith.-Proverbs, xv. 16.

But now, being made free from sin, and become serbants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.—Romans, vi. 22.

PRAY WITH DISCRETION.

MUST helpless man in ignorance sedate,

Roll darkling down the torrent of his fate?

Must no dislike alarm, no wishes rise,

No cries invoke the mercies of the skies?
Inquirer, cease: petitions yet remain

Which Heaven may hear, nor deem religion vain.
Still raise for good the supplicating voice,

But leave to Heaven the measure and the choice.
Safe in His power whose eyes discern afar
The secret ambush of a specious prayer;
Implore His aid, in His decisions rest,

Secure whate'er He gives, He gives the best.

Johnson.

REFLECTIONS.

GIVE not thy tongue too great a liberty, lest it take thee

prisoner. A word unspoken is, like the sword in the scabbard, thine: if vented, thy sword is in another's hand. If thou desire to be held wise, be so wise as to hold thy tongue. -QUARLES.

Death and life are in the power of the tongue; and they that love it shall eat thê fruit thereof.—PROVERBS,

xviii. 21.

Seek ye the Lord while he may be found; call ye upon him while he is near.—Isaiah, lv. 6.

TRUE KNOWLEDGE.

HO thus alternate see

W

His death and victory,

Rising and falling as on angel wings,

They, while they seem to roam,
Draw daily nearer home,

Their heart untravell'd still adores the King of kings.

Or, if at home they stay,
Yet are they, day by day,

In spirit journeying through the glorious land,
Not for light Fancy's reed,

Nor Honour's purple meed,

Nor gifted Prophet's lore, nor Science' wondrous wand.

But more than Prophet, more

Than Angels can adore

With face unveil'd, is He they go to seek :

Blessed be God, whose grace

Shows Him in every place

To homeliest hearts of pilgrims pure and meek.

Keble.

REFLECTIONS.

WHAT sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a

human soul. The philosopher, the saint, and the herothe wise, the good, and the great man, very often lie hid and concealed in a plebeian, which a proper education might have disinterred, and have brought to light.-"Spectator.

He is in the way of life that keepeth instruction; but he that refuseth reproof erreth.—Proverbs, x. 17.

For the law of the spirit of life in Jesus Christ hath made me free from the law of sin and death.-ROMANS, viii. 2.

TH

HIS SERVIce is freeDOM.

HE Saviour lends the light and heat
That crowns His holy hill;

The saints, like stars, around His seat
Perform their courses still.

The saints above are stars in Heaven-
What are the saints on earth?

Like trees they stand whom God has given
Our Eden's happy birth.

Faith is their fix'd, unswerving root,
Hope their unfading flower,

Fair deeds of charity their fruit,

The glory of their bower.

The dew of Heaven is like Thy grace,
It steals in silence down;
But where it lights, the favour'd place
By richest fruits is known.

Keble.

REFLECTIONS.

CHRISTIANITY looks upon all the human race as children

of the same father, and wishes them equal blessings: in ordering us to do good, to love our brethren, to forgive injuries, and to study peace, it quite annihilates the disposition for martial glory, and utterly debases the pomp of war.-BISHOP WATSON.

The integrity of the upright shall guide them: but the perversity of transgressors shall destroy them.-PROVERBS, xi. 3.

The Lord God which gathereth the outcasts of Esrael saith, Det will E gather others to him, beside those that are gathered unto him.—ISAIAH, lvi. 8.

LORD, SET US FREE.

WHERE

THERE the prison bars surround him,
In his chains see Peter dwell;

Where the sentinel hath bound him,

Pacing by his gloomy cell;
What avail, when Jesus watches,
Prison chains, and sentinel?
Lo, a light, from heaven descending,
Glimmers like a beauteous star;
And an angel, o'er him bending,
Makes the winged night flee afar ;
Bursts the iron chains asunder,
And removes the massy bar.
We in prison chains are sleeping,
Chains of sin which angels see;
Dimmest night our souls is steeping:
Christ, our light, our liberty,
Break Thou all our chains and fetters,
Lighten us, and make us free!

REFLECTIONS.

HE who breaks the fetters of slavery and delivers a nation from thraldom forms, in my opinion, the noblest comment on the great law of love, whilst he distributes the greatest blessing which man can receive from man. But, next to that is the merit of him who, in times like the present, 'watches over the edifice of public liberty, repairs its foundations, and strengthens its cement when he beholds it hastening to decay. -ROBERT HALL.

For the upright shall dwell in the land, and the perfect shall remain in it.-PROVERBS, ii. 21.

M