book?' I would reply; 'is it not contrary to your caste? Howadaya adaray baharla huttu niluttaday, 'Yes, sir; but it stands a long time' And to obtain a book that would stand a long time, they were willing to contract a little defilement.

In the intervals of preaching we frequently walked round the market, entering freely into conversation with groups or individuals, thus both winning their confidence, and familiarly explaining the truths they had heard us announce. When in our tent, the door was open, and a tempting pile of books lying on the table, we were seldom without a visitor; and thus, in one way or other, almost every moment of the day was turned to account.

EDITOR'S PORTFOLIO.

"CLEAVE WITH PURPOSE OF HEART TO THE LORD." (Acts ii. 23)-This is a strong expression. It implies, with all the desire, with all the strength, with all the energy of the soul, cleave unto the Lord, hold fast the truth, the living, the Incarnate Word, that pure and morning beam, that fair and immortal beam, which nothing can extinguish; and which, having once arisen upon the soul, shall shine on, expanding, increasing brighter and brighter, until all things are subjugated to its supremacy-till all the faculties of the soul are brought under the power of its holy, peaceful, purifying, blessed dominion.

TIME, PRECIOUS TIME.--A certain writer calls spare minutes the gold dust of time. Each of them seems too little for you to feel the loss of; but if you gather many of them, you discover their weight and value. Young says truly, as well as strikingly, "Sands make the mountain; moments make the year." Remember, then, that in losing one moment, you lose a part of the year; a loss which can never be re-called. And while you lose that moment, Satan gains it; for he never finds easier access to you with his temptations, than in the moments which you suffer to run to waste.

THE ENLIGHTENING POWER OF FAITH-Such was the care with which the Bible was studied by the Emperor Alexander, of Russia, that when he first began reading the Holy Scriptures, as often as the meaning seemed obscure, he put a cross before each verse which he could not understand. These at the commencement were very numerous, but the pious monarch said, "On the second perusal many crosses were erased, and since then they are diminishing continually."-The Business of Life.

NOT TO BE IN LOVE WITH SIN.-It is observable, that Xerxes bare a strange affection to the plane-tree, which he hung about with chains, and decked with jewels of greatest price. A fond and foolish affection, as being to a tree, and such a tree as is good for nothing but to shade one out of the sun. This folly of so great a monarch very well resembleth all those who are not guided by the Spirit of God into the ways of truth and life, but are led by the spirit of error, or by the error of their own spirits, to ungodly and sinful courses-the very beaten paths to hell and death. The tree they are in love with, and adorn, and spend so much cost upon, is the forbidden tree of sin, altogether unfruitful as that of Xerxes. It

hath neither fair blossoms nor sweet fruit on it, only it is well grown, hath large arms and broad boughs, and casteth a good shade; or, to speak properly, a shadow of good, a noisome or pestilent shade, making the ground barren, and killing the best plants of virtues, by depriving them of the sunshine of God's grace; yet as divers nations, in the days of Pliny, paid tribute to the Romans for the shade of these trees, so do these men pay for the seeming delight and pleasure of sin (being indeed but a shadow of vanity) to the devil, the greatest tribute that can be paid, even the tribute of their most precious souls.-Featly.

WANT OF ZEAL.-Others again, who do not quite refuse their work, put only half a soul into it. They have no zeal for their profession. They somehow scramble through it; but it is without any noble enthusiasm-any appetite for work, or any love to the God who gives it. If they are entrusted with the property of others, they cannot boast as Jacob did: "In the day the drought consumed me, and the frost by night; and my sleep departed from mine eyes. God hath seen mine affliction and the labour of my hands." If entrusted with the souls of others, they cannot reckon up "the abundant labours, the often journeyings, the weariness, and painfulness, the watchings, the hunger and thirst," the perils and privations which, for the love of his Master and his Master's work, the Apostle of the Gentiles joyfully encountered. If scholars, they are content to learn their lesson, so that no fault shall be found. If servants, they aspire to nothing more than fulfilling their inevitable toils. And if occupying official stations, they are satisfied with a decent discharge of customary duties, and are glad if they leave things no worse than they found them. They are hirelings, perfunctory, heartless in all they do. Their work is so sleepily done that it is enough to make you lethargic to labour in their company; and, before they go zealously and wakefully to work, they would need to be startled up into the day-light of actual existence-they would need to be shaken from that torpor into which the very sight of labour is apt to entrance them. Oh, happier far, to lose health and life itself in clear, brisk, conscious working; to spend the last atom of strength, and yield the vital spark itself in joyful, wakeful efforts for Him who did all for us-than to drawl through a dreaming life, with all the fatigue of labour and nothing of its sweetness; snoring in a constant lethargy; sleeping while you work, and night-mared with labour when you really sleep.-Hamilton.

CORRESPONDENCE.

SCRIPTURE DIFFICULTIES.
MATT. ix. 16, 17.

I THINK it is because the context of verses 14 and 15 is disjoined in the other Gospels from verses 16 and 17 by a paragraphical mark that it (the context) has not sufficiently been taken as the key to the parable, making very simple a parable that, without it, is very obscure.

The simple meaning of old bottles and new wine is evidently this: that as fasting and signs of melancholy would be inconsistent during a happy marriage life, and mirth and feasting inconsistent during widowhood; so would old aud new garments, pieced together, not answer, or newly fermented wine put into old, dry, shrivelled skins. The motions and excitability of the fermentation would crack the skin bottles.

Who can sing the Lord's song in a strange land? How unreasonable to expect it! So the days were coming when the Bridegroom-head of the church would leave her behind Him in this wilderness world. Then she would fast, and mourn, and weep; but why should she now, while He yet was with her?

The Bridegroom being now in heaven, the church is still mourning; but when He who is our resurrection and our life shall appear, and when we shall, after death, be joined to our glorious resurrection bodies, the days of our mourning shall be ended. "Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning."

H. L.

REV. SIR,-In reply to the question of "Mary W.," in the last number of the "Teacher's Visitor," it must be observed, that in order to come at any right conclusion on the point, it will be necessary to refer to the 14th verse, where the disciples of John and the Pharisees seemed to cast censure on Christ's followers for not practising (as they supposed) the duty of fasting, which they considered the most essential part of religion. As John was a man of mortified habits, and led an austere life, it is natural to suppose he would enforce a similar strictness on his followers; and, probably, as he was in prison at this time, they might have been more frequent in this duty on his behalf, and, consequently, took that opportunity of censuring the disciples of Christ for their less self-denying habits. It was uncharitable in them to suppose, however, that they did not fast at all, because they ought to have known that fasting was included in Christ's precepts, though it was to be practised in secret, and not like the Pharisees, that "they might appear unto men to fast."

In reply to the question, therefore, in the 14th verse, Christ reminds them in the 15th, of John's testimony concerning himself as "The Bridegroom" of the church, and brings forward as an example an Eastern marriage, when, just as it would be unnatural for the children of the bridechamber (or friends of the Bridegroom) to mourn in the presence of the Bridegroom, so could not his disciples mourn in their Master's presence: however, he intimated that the hour was

coming-alluding to his crucifixion and ascension-when they would have to undergo suffering and persecution, and, consequently, would be called to such self-denying duties; but, till that time, our Lord did not see it right to impose upon them such rigorous acts.

We now come to the doctrine contained in the 16th and 17th verses, which appears to be that of prudence. This He illustrated by two similitudes: for as it was not usual, nor would it have been prudent, according to the ways of life, to put a piece of new unscoured cloth into an old garment, or to pour new unfermented wine into old leathern bottles, so it would not have been spiritually prudent in Him to have imposed the duty of fasting on His disciples, (which was never put forth as essential, but only as a help to religion,) who were as yet but "babes." He thought it but according to His infinite wisdom gradually to inure them to self-denial, hardships, and sufferings, lest they should be discouraged and faint in the outset of the way.

It is more than probable, however, that our Lord's primary intention, in the last two verses, was to prove the utter impossibility of a coalition between the religion of the Pharisees and even of John's disciples with his own: for the Mosaic dispensation was only ordained for an especial purpose for a season (Gal. iii. 19—22.,—all was to be done away in Christ. He came to introduce a new and more spiritual dispensation. "The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." The Jews sought to establish their own righteousness, and refused to build upon the only sure Foundation. The Pharisees equally set at nought the Corner Stone; and by long prayers and fastings, and, as our Lord declares, "cleansing the outside of the cup and the platter," thought all would be right within. This attempt at a coalition between the old and new dispensation-between the religion of the Pharisees, which consisted in outward forms and ceremonies, and that of Jesus, which required men to pass through the strait gate of repentance and faith-was the grand fault of the Judaizing teachers of Christianity, against whom St. Paul so zealously contended in his Epistle to the Galatians. "They wanted," as an old divine observes, "to mend the Pharisaical religion-which was an old worn-out garment-with the Gospel, and to put the 'new wine' of the Gospel into the 'old bottles' of the antiquated ceremonies of the Mosaic Law and the Tradition of the Elders:" that is to say, as the laws of human prudence prevented the one, so those of spiritual prudence prevented the other. E. G.

Hinderclay, Dec. 13, 1848.

SUMMARY OF NEWS.

"There are many devices in a man's heart: nevertheless the counsel of the Lord that shall stand."

THE annual statement of the revenue of the country has been lately issued; and in dissecting its items we find some reason for encouragement, rather than despondency. In the two great sources of income there is an increase both on the last quarter, and on the whole year ending January, 1849. The gross increase is £533,957 on the year, £186,827 on the quarter. We must, however, add, that £539,305 have been received as China money in the year. The decrease is observable in the stamps, taxes, property tax, and postoffice. This latter we are sorry to see, as it is an important consideration.

In Glasgow, at the time we are writing, the cholera still continues to rage; but in the metropolis, and other towns of England, it is, if not quiescent, by no means aggravated. We must, however, except in this statement the juvenile institution at Tooting. Its appearance there has been most malignant, and its attacks, in a large number of cases, fatal. The last report we have seen, gives as the number of patients since its commencement 241, deaths 73, under medical treatment 168.

We regret to record the appearance of cholera at Derry. With the exception of Belfast and Drogheda, we do not remember that it has visited that unhappy country. Unhappy, for we can report no symptoms of amelioration. Fever and starvation are doing their work of death. Thousands are bidding farewell to it for ever, and settling down in America-the advance guard, as a leading journal shrewdly surmises of a departure, en masse, of the poorer portion of the inhabitants.

How delightful at such a time is it to contemplate the progress of various religious societies for the spiritual welfare of Ireland!

The Irish society for the spiritual exigencies of that country has recently issued its report. Its object has been principally to assist other societies in their work. This has been done to the amount of £9,000. But the necessity of the case has now caused the committee to take a separate and independent line, and the object is proposed to be effected by sending a number of additional curates to the Roman Catholic population in the south and west of the country. May God look down upon and prosper this and every other undertaking for his glory.

We turn to a far different subject. Most painful it is for a reli