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to forsake a course of iniquity and to employ their energies in some suitable sphere of humble industry, need not despair. The way of recovery is by the blessing of God easier than they may at first suppose. There was perhaps a time when, flattering themselves respecting their own virtue and purity, even the benevolent were ready to say to the unhappy daughters of passion, Come not near to us, for we are holier than you. But the Lord of Christianity, which is gradually triumphing over all the delusions of men, has taught us another lesson. He taught the Pharisees of his time that they had their pollutions, as well as the publicans and the harlots they spurned and abominated. When he brought his divine scrutiny to bear upon their characters he observed that the two latter classes, considering their temptations and disadvantages, were often less guilty than their accusers.

Christians are, we trust, beginning more than ever to feel that if their Lord, the eternal Judge of all, chose when on earth thus to condescend to the heart-broken victims of debauchery,—if he stooped to raise those who were abandoned and outcast, and hopeless and heartbroken,-if some of his most illustrious converts were selected from this class of fallen and lapsed unfortunates,-if he always treated them with the most consummate tenderness, and proclaimed full and free forgiveness in every case of repentance,-they need not be ashamed to imitate his condescension. The light of his divine example is gradually triumphing over the unhallowed conceits of society. Chris

tians are beginning to give up that unheavenly prudery which made the disciple above his Lord, and idolized self at the expense of humanity, philanthropy, and charity. Zeal towards God has happily become more according to knowledge, and religious men now see what injury they did to themselves and their neighbours by the mistaken forms of a morbid and detestable etiquette. They have at length discovered that the peculiar adaptation of Christianity consists in its presenting means of recovery, not for the righteous, but for sinners, in affording place for repentance and opportunity of amendment to transgressors of the first magnitude and the deepest stain,—that the light of the gospel dawned on earth not merely to remove trifling offences, but to dispel real, enormous, and overwhelming clouds of sin, which no efforts of man could ever have dissipated.

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To the degraded and outcast of their race, more especial earnestness, the messenger of truth proclaims the glad tidings of salvation and the pardon of sin. To the unfortunate victims of profligacy they say, "Go to the fountain that is opened for sin and for uncleanness, and though your sins be as scarlet they shall be white as snow."

"Like Mary kneel, like Mary weep;

Love much and be forgiven."

HINTS FOR YOUNG LADIES.

Tusks is one thing in the conduct of young ladies which has often surprised and grieved us. We know

that there are noble exceptions, but young ladies in general act as if they were not at all aware of the influence which they exert over the other sex. The notoriously profligate, if they belong to a certain rank in society, are admitted into the company of the refined and elegant, and receive as warm a welcome as the most pious and irreproachable, if not in many cases a much warmer. But surely this ought not to be. Leaving religion out of the question, delicacy, propriety, and every thing which constitutes feminine excellence, forbid it. She whose heart is not a stranger to the feelings of sensibility and benevolence must do violence to her own nature when she smiles upon the known gamester, who in his cold and utter selfishness would not scruple to impoverish his friend. The maiden of softness and refinement, even though she should not unhappily revere and love the sacred name, must nevertheless, one would imagine, be shocked to hear it pronounced with flippancy and mingled with oaths and jests by the profane; and youthful purity and loveliness ought certainly to turn with abhorrence and disgust from the man who would prey upon innocence or debase himself in the haunts of pollution. The excellent Mrs. Hannah More has set an example in this respect well worthy of universal imitation. "In one family," she observes, "in which I thought I had secured an agreeable intimacy, I INSTAŃTLY DESERTED on observing the gracious and engaging reception given by the ladies to more than one libertine of the most notorious profligacy. The men were handsome, and elegant, and fashionable, and had figured in newspapers and courts of justice. This degrading popularity rather attracted than repelled attention; and, while the guilty associates in their crime were shunned with abhorrence by these

very ladies, the specious undoers were not only received with complaisance, but there was a sort of competition who should be most strenuous in their endeavours to attract them. Surely women of fashion can hardly make a more corrupt use of influence, a talent for which they will be peculiarly accountable. Surely, mere personal purity can hardly deserve the name of virtue in those who can sanction notoriously vicious characters, which their reprobation, if it could not reform, would at least degrade!"

If young ladies would enter into a mutual compact to frown upon vice in all its forms, if like Mrs. More they would resolve to hold no companionship with those who tacitly encourage it, the aspect of society would, we are persuaded, be soon changed, and the world might expect to see better fathers and better sons, better brothers and better husbands.

This is not a dream of the imagination. Every day's experience and observation serves to convince us that the influence of woman chiefly forms the manners of the age, at least in countries where she has been raised to her proper rank as the companion and not the slave of man. Miserable indeed is the land where it is otherwise.

"Go find a land where female grace
Is honoured by no gallant race,
And man's dominion deems it vile
To bend beneath a woman's smile,
But tramples with a brute delight
On mental rank and moral right.
How darkly do her people sink!
How meanly act! How basely think!
No loftiness that clime reveals,
No purity the spirit feels,

Corruption cankers law and throne,
The language breathes a dungeon tone,

And seldom there hath virtue smiled,
But withered, weakened, and defiled,
It moulders on from age to age,
The scorn of hero, bard, and sage,
And seems on glorious earth to be
The plague-spot of her infamy."

Woman was given to man as his better angel, to dissuade him from vice, to stimulate him to virtue, to render home delightful and life joyous; and when, in the exercise of those gentle qualities which form her brightest ornament, she fulfils her high vocation in the various relations of life-as mother, wife, sister, daughter, friend-she exerts a power which blesses while it captivates. We have known her meekness, her tenderness, her patience, and her Christian firmness, to be triumphant, under God, in subduing vice and awakening virtue when all other means seemed powerless. We have seen the drunkard melt into tears of contrition and sorrow, overcome by the mild and affectionate appeals of an uncomplaining and heart-stricken wife. We have seen the passionate man subdued to the docility of a child by the soft and appeasing answers of an amiable daughter. We have seen the unblushing libertine bend with remorse before the pure, and dignified, and lovely of the earth, who instead of encouraging his vices by the smile of approbation and blandishment, turned from him with virtuous and maidenly reserve. What may not be expected from a virtuous woman?

"Her love is oft a light to virtue's path;

It dawns, and withering passions die away,
Low raptures fade, pure feelings blossom forth,
And that which wisdom's philosophic beam
Could never from the wintry heart awake
By love is smiled into celestial birth."

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