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When they enter each other's houses, the visitor prays for the peace of the inmates, whilst they stand up. The same thing is done when the visitor departs.

Before and after meals, they stand round the table, and each, having his hands clasped, silently engages in thanksgiving and prayer. Haddington.

ON THOMAS CARLYLE'S WRITINGS.

J. C. B.

THE paper in your December Magazine on the writings of Thomas Carlyle contains the following sentence :-" We may say what we do know, when we assert, that many young men in our seminaries of learning have lost their faith in the Bible, as a special revelation from God, by reading Carlyle."

It is not quite clear to me whose language this is, and consequently, whether reference is made to our British colleges, or to those across the Atlantic. If the latter seminaries are intended, probably the evil influence of Carlyle may be almost entirely confined to lay-students, and though, in this case, much to be deplored, yet not so likely to propagate itself as it would be were "many" of our youthful theologians under its control. There is, however, reason to feel some alarm, lest our pulpits as well as our pews should receive injury from this fascinating and splendid development of infidelity.*

The readers of the Congregational Magazine are much indebted both to the Editor and to Mr. Richardson, for the information and the cautions with which the paper in question abounds; while, I doubt not, some of them, with the writer of this piece, have thought the strictures are made in a spirit more candid and forbearing than desirable; at least, that the warning and reprobation are not sufficiently loud and strong. We have recently witnessed in Episcopal animadversions on the Pusey errors, that delicate reproofs are in danger of being construed into encouragements.

I leave it for those who look for light at the bottom of a well, to determine what Kant and his admirers understand by TRANSCENDENTAL; whether it is the synonyme of à priori, or of incomprehensible; these persons likewise will be able to distinguish the pious inspiration of Carlyle from the pantheism of Spinoza. My mind, however, is not so philosophic as to be unmoved when the Holy Scriptures are placed on a level with the Koran, the Divine Comedy of Danté, Shakspere, and Homer; when the same honours are attributed to the inspiration of Burns weeping over a daisy, or holding sympathy with Tam O'Shanter, as are to the Divine afflatus which bore the prophetic soul

* The words quoted are part of the Rev. Merrill Richardson's Essay, and refer not to British but American colleges.-EDITOR.

onwards to future Gospel scenes, and moved the New Testament scribes to register the deep things of God-things which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard. This is indeed to think that Jehovah is altogether such an one as ourselves, and virtually, with whatever poetic grace, to deny the real Divine inspiration of the Bible, and its paramount authority: it is to reject Christianity.

Should this writer gain influence over any of our theological students, by the charm of his bold and brilliant speculations, it will be a serious affliction to the churches; and I doubt not, that those who have to guide the studies of our young brethren are alive to this danger. They will, I conceive, feel it a duty to discourage attention to these philosophic rhapsodies, till the mind shall have been prepared for their consideration with less hazard and more advantage. And should

a case present itself of one who has "lost faith in the Bible, as a special revelation from God," after due expostulation and forbearance, he will be removed from the institution. I am not an advocate for a young man being supported through his academic curriculum by the go-cart of a tutor, even were it practicable, but would leave him, to a considerable extent, to his own independent thought and piety. I know, too, that young men of the most unquestionable devotedness, have their days, it may be weeks, of sore temptation and perplexity; and that this battling with infidel adversaries, may, as in the instance of Cecil, qualify for future service to the faith; but where there is a disposition to unbelief, to settle down in the persuasion, that the glorious Gospel of the blessed God is only one of many forms of true religion, there is an unfitness for the work of the Christian ministry. The avenues must be fenced if the sacred desk is to be kept pure. vivid belief in the Scriptures, as a special revelation from God, is essential to the sincerity, the authority, the comfort, and the unction of evangelical preaching. "We believe, and therefore speak." I cannot express my feelings for the man who, like Bolingbroke, sees that the doctrines of grace are the doctrines of the New Testament, and yet believes not in the Divine inspiration of that volume: who accepts it for the sake of his own credit in society, and because, with other books, it helps him to "speak to our condition." A minister of this character, however orthodox and gifted, may have the lever, but he has no fulcrum; he may have the form and the bulk of Samson, but where is the hair of his strength?

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It is a comfort, however, that in the present excited state of intellectual progression, our students will be too much employed in more healthy exercises to allow them time for vain imaginations; the straightforward argument will be too arduous to permit many transcendental episodes. And I am persuaded it will be better to go to excess in classics, as at Oxford, or especially in mathematics, as at Cambridge, than in moral philosophy, as it is termed, during the college course;

and to leave the important, indeed, but hazardous pursuits of this last branch of science to a more ripe and sober period of life, to a season of more leisure and experience.

We have to be thankful, that not a few of our ministers are qualified to challenge Kant and Carlyle, and every other Antichristian champion. Our churches are indebted to them for the force of reason and of piety with which they combat philosophy, falsely so called. We would, however, most respectfully ask those gifted brethren who gather around them, on the Lord's day, groups of our theological students, whether too great an anxiety in their public discourses to show the philosophy of divinity, to start and hunt down Germanic reveries, and to look at the ever shifting reflection of the agitated vase, which,—

"Omnia pervolitat late loca,"

does not incur some hazard of diverting the inquisitive and ardent minds of youth from the prose, the common-place of the Gospel; from the simplicity and fervour of spiritual, scriptural piety?—Whether they may not be led to doubtful disputations, when they most need the sure word of prophecy?-Whether the master may not raise devils, which the disciples cannot easily lay?—And whether there is not reason to fear, that some may retain the questionable and lose hold of the certain, and be tempted to philosophize, when they ought to "preach the word; to be instant in season, out of season; to reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and doctrine;" to preach Jesus Christ and him crucified?

What can be thought to be more aerial and unsubstantial than a transcendental sermon, preached by a young man of moderate parts, without the redeeming qualities of rich feeling and deep experimental godliness? This is happily at present an hypothesis, but one that may be realized.

We must all perceive the signs of the times in their aspect towards religion. The more cheering symptoms are the excitement, the zeal, and the progressive quantity of real, evangelical piety: the distressing omens are infidelity, superstition, and daring speculation.

The foundations are threatened. Popery, covered with a transparent mask, may well alarm the spiritually minded in the national church; and it behoves dissenters, whose strength and glory is their adherence to the simplicity of the Gospel, to be much on their guard against their own peculiar dangers-dangers arising out of even a laudable desire to improve in both political importance and intellectual attainment. And we conceive that among these dangers, a prominent station may be assigned to a temptation to overrate talent and mental cultivation; to give too much indulgence to the conjectures of philosophy, and the claims of a subtle and hazardous independency of thinking; and to neglect those plain and all-momentous verities which demand the obedience of faith to "THUS SAITH THE Lord."

J. K. FOSTER,

OPINIONS ON SMOKING TOBACCO.

MR. EDITOR, I So frequently hear remarks made to the disadvantage of those ministers who indulge in the use of the pipe or the cigar, that I have often wished to address a few remarks to them on the subject. The venerable Mr. Jay, in his new edition of "Memoirs of the late Rev. Cornelius Winter," which is just published, has put upon record a useful and forcible protest against the custom, which I beg to transcribe for your pages, instead of sending any remarks of my own.

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In the text (page 200) Mr. Jay states that his venerable tutor “did not think it unnecessary to guard his students against superfluous wants and unseemly customs; against the sottish and offensive habit of smoking," &c. To these words he has appended the following important note. "Here the author has been not slightly censured by some of his brethren. very renowned smoker said his language nearly approached to blasphemy-expressing withal his wonder that Milton, in speaking of the productions of Eden, had never mentioned the noblest of them all, the tobacco-plant. Though this might seem to be only uttered jocosely, it had some verity of sentiment in it; and there have been known some to whom perhaps few things would be deemed so paradisaical as this stupid luxury.

His opinion

"The author, however, does not renounce or soften his expressions. has been confirmed and strengthened by the observation of many years; and he cannot but lament that no physical or civil consideration, and no motive, derived from usefulness or decorum, can induce many preachers to avoid or break off this exceptionable habit. "He has called it a sottish practice.' And is it not so in its appearance? fume? smell? and immoral associations in the mind of the observer? Does it not hint almost inevitably the pot-house, and the low and sailorly fellowships there? Let a person enter a room in the morning where there has been smoking overnight, will the devout savour remind him of a sanctuary, or lead him to think of an assembly of divines? "He has called it an offensive practice.' And is it not so to many of his own profession, and to many of his own sex? But how trying is it to females, almost without exception! though, from the kindness and obligingness of their nature and manners, they frequently submit to a usage which annoys their persons, and defiles and injures the apartment and furniture whose neatness they so much value. Can ridicule and satire do nothing here?

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'The pipe with solemn interposing puff,

Make half a sentence at a time enough;

The dozing sages drop the drowsy strain,

Then pause and puff—and speak and puff again.

But often like the tube they so admire,

Important triflers! have more smoke than fire.
Pernicious weed! whose scent the fair annoys,
Unfriendly to society's chief joys;

N. S. VOL. VII.

Thy worst effect is banishing for hours
The sex whose presence civilizes ours.
Thou art indeed the drug the gard'ner wants
To poison vermin that infest his plants:
But are we so to wit and beauty blind,
As to despise the glory of our kind,
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And show the softest minds and fairest forms,

As little mercy as he grubs and worms?'

"We say nothing of the silliness of the practice, especially in 'a bishop,' who 'should be grave;' but to see a man of education, and filling an office which would dignify an angel, passing so much of his time with a tube in his mouth, and emitting therefrom the smoke of a burning herb, as if his head was on fire, must, were it not for its commonness, always excite an inquiry or a laugh. Nor do we speak of its vulgarity. But is not every shop-boy, every apprentice-lad, every silly coxcomb, every pert fop, every common traveller upon a stage-coach, seen now with a pipe in his mouth or a cigar? (The railroad companies wisely forbid the desecration of their vehicles.) And should its expensiveness be overlooked? It indeed befriends government, as the consumed article pays a high duty and yields a large profit; but can every preacher afford (for so it may be relatively to him) such a dear indulgence, consistently with the claims of household comfort and the education of his children, and some charity to the poor and needy?

"Or should its injuriousness be forgotten?

Need persons be told that tobacco is a very powerful narcotic poison? If the saliva, (the secretion of which it produces,) being impregnated with its essential oil, be swallowed, the deleterious influence is carried directly into the stomach; or if, as most frequently happens, it is discharged, then the blandest fluid, which performs, as a solvent and diluent, an office in digestion secondary only to the gastric juice itself, is lost. But is it not an ensnaring habit with regard to the waste of time, the danger (frequently) of drinking, and fondness for company, not always of the most refined and improving sort?

"I deal therefore with the thing most seriously: speaking boldly, as at my age I ought to speak. Were I upon a committee of examination, I would never consent to the admission of a young man into one of our academical institutions, but upon the condition that he did not, and would not smoke.

"I would exact the same condition from every student, if I filled the responsible as well as honourable office of tutor.

"Were I a member of a Christian church, I would never give my suffrage in favour of a ministerial candidate who was a slave to his pipe.

“And if I were a man of affluence, I would not on any application afford any pecuniary assistance to a preacher, who, while he complained of the smallness and inadequateness of his means, could afford to reduce it by indulging this needless and wasteful expense.

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"The author was one day attending a missionary meeting. Before the close of it, a minister arose, and said he had to present a donation. The offering was not indeed large in itself, but it showed a nobleness of disposition, and was beyond the two mites of the applauded widow. These two guineas,' said he, are sent from a servant, who was allowed so much by her mistress for tea, but who had, during the last two years, denied herself the use of this beverage to aid your collection.' But suppose a person had immediately said, Go thou and do likewise. Spare for the all-important cause the eight or ten pounds which you spend in wanton, in needless, and noxious gratification; and at our next anniversary how many will praise and bless you! . . . . A minister should be an example, and not require one. But behold there are first that shall be last, and there are last that shall be first.

"We want ministers to do as well as to teach. We want them to be not only harmless and blameless, but praiseworthy. We want them to adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things, exemplifying not only all that is moral, but all that is becoming in life and religion; all that is lovely and of good report; all that has any virtue or praise in it."

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