come to our country, we'll tear you to pieces,”—and then another yell, and another volley of stones.

We saw our peril, and resolved for the present to refrain from preaching in the open air; and next day, at noon, being Sabbath, we had sufficient evidence of the wisdom of this resolution, for a mob of ruffians from the hill sides, for many miles round, had been gathered in to assault us, and were congregated in the square waiting our appearance. But we went quietly, and by a private path, to the Protestant church, and heard an excellent and evangelical sermon from the curate-the Rev. John De Renzy-an earnest man, and one who is valiant for the truth. Five times in one year have the windows of his house been broken by the popish mob; and twice, during our brief sojourn in Cahir, were he and his lady assailed and stoned on leaving our meetings in the dusk of the evening; but still he perseveres, contending earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints. God speed his efforts! From him and the vicar, Mr Giles, the deputies received the greatest attention and kindness, and the assurance that their visit was gratifying to them, and would do much good.

The mob collected in Cahir Square on the noon of the Lord's day had that morning received their commission. In common with our brethren in other parts, we were denounced by the priest from the altar. No text-no sermon had he. A harangue against the missionaries was his only discourse. These denunciations were substantially the same in all the cases of which we have heard, in so far as concerns their tendency to instigate the mob to mischief. The people get the hint, and they not only understand it, but must obey it. But more of this anon.

With us at Cahir, the Sabbath passed, off quietly; and in the evening we had divine service in our own hired house-the Rev. Mr Dickenson, who was so maltreated at Limerick, officiating on the occasion. It was otherwise with our friends at Tipperary. Although they had not preached out of doors, but in the Presbyterian church, they were mobbed and insulted on the way to their hotel,—some of the windows of which were smashed by the infuriated rabble. It is well that there are many and divers witnesses of the truth of these things, and, among others, that we have the testimony of a gentleman whose praise is in all the churches-one who has taken a leading interest in this movement, and who went personally to Tipperary. We say this is well, for we fear lest our friends in Scotland should refuse to credit our statements, and call them exaggerated, or at least attribute our rough reception to our own imprudence. Our brethren abandoned the town of Tipperary, and came down to us at Cahir. Here, amid hootings and peltings and annoyances, not a few, we held our position-simply because Cahir is a military stronghold. There were sixty infantry in the town, and about four hundred cavalry in the immediate vicinity, and this with the vigilance of the police overawed the mob. Every night we held a meeting in the school-room above referred to, and preached to as many as it would contain, a few Roman Catholics being present on each occasion. Our perseverance exasperated the rabble without, and led to the cowardly attacks, we have mentioned, upon the curate Mr De Renzy on his way home. Let us hope that some good impression has been left at Cahir-that the power of its Maynooth priests will speedly be broken, and the fierce spirit of its degraded population be exchanged for the meekness of Christ.

Two of us took our departure with regret, leaving other two to carry on the work in that district for a few days longer, and bent our steps to the smaller towns and villages around. In one of these, Galbally, a good work

is going on, and we were glad to learn, that when the Rev. John Ker of Glasgow, preached there a few days prior to our visit, not only were there some Romanists openly amongst his audience, but what is better, and what was not discovered at the time, there were a goodly number of them quietly planted behind the hedge, close by which the preacher took his stand. The village priest who was on the watch, got their names, and they were to be denounced at the altar next Lord's day. Leaving Galbally, we went to visit Cork and Queenstown, and having preached the Gospel there, we returned to Dublin to give some account of our stewardship.

Let this suffice for the narrative part of the Tipperary division, and let us now generalize a little, and elicit if we can the spirit of the movement, the causes of its comparative failure, and its probable results.

It is readily granted, that with a few favourable exceptions, such as Carlow, Waterford, and Birr, the chief object of mission-preaching out of doors to the Romanists, has not been gained. And why not? The writer of this paper feels disposed to attribute this comparative failure in some measure, to the sudden substitution of the south of Ireland for the west, as the field of operations, and to the immature character of the arrangements for our reception there. But, however this may be, there are other causes of present failure which may be noticed.

The POWER of the PRIESTS is one and the chief of these. We knew well ere we visited Ireland the intolerant spirit of Popery, but certainly we had no conception, that, in this land and under British rule, the priests could so far carry that spirit into practice, as to set all order and authority at defiance and hound on the ignorant mob, to attack and maltreat peaceable British subjects. Let the popish press in their sneering mendacity, attribute our safety to the priests if they will;-to them and to them only, as the prime instigators, we attribute our danger: nor is the proof far to seek. From every popish altar in Munster, the missionaries were denounced very much in the same terms, and every one who knows anything of the power of the priests, knows that a hint from them at the altar is equivalent to a command which the mob must obey. The terms of denunciation were, in general, something like these, and our readers will please to mark their cunning. "Don't go beyond the law, boys, don't strike these men, but let them down aisy." Now this "letting down aisy" needs explanation to a Scottish mind, and we got it from the Roman Catholic servant of a Protestant clergyman. “Sure, sir, didn't we know well enough what it means? It means to get a man into a mob, and jostle him till he is thrown down, and then the crowd will run over him, and if he is hurt or killed, it's nobody that does it!!"

Nor is it over the ignorant rabble only that the priests wield such a fearful influence-men of intelligence, magistrates, and mayors too, are in many places under their tyrannic sway, and this, not so much because they dread their power over the life to come, as because they know that by their influence with the multitude the priests can ruin their trade! If the mayor of a town is a grocer or baker, he must obey the will of the priest, or his occupation is soon gone. The holy father plants himself at the altar when the multitude are there at mass, he does not in express terms say, “Don't buy your bread from that baker, or your sugar from that grocer;" but he says, "Sure now, boys, that man is not of the right sort-wouldn't it be a nice thing to see the grass growing at his door?" and the boys understand well what this means, and the baker or grocer may leave the place, or his trade will leave him.

Instances without number might be adduced in proof of these allegations.

Let the reader consult Dr Dill's book for facts. These southern priests, and especially the Maynooth-bred ones, are above all law but that of the Jesuit general. They frequent the hotels, the steamers, the railways, the pay-tables of large employers, and even the post-office, as spies. The confessional comes to their aid, and gives them a marvellous power over the people, making the poor creatures extremely jealous of one another, and bringing out, now and again, in the midst of all their degradation, most hopeful symptoms of a strong under-current—a desire to trick their spiritual advisers where they can venture to do it with safety. They are ostensibly at the priest's bidding; and their fury is fierce against Protestant teachers; but we have some proof that it is often feigned. In short, to those who have not witnessed the state of Ireland with their own eyes, we know of nothing so like the promptings of the priests, and the yell of the people, as the ringing of a bell every morning at nine o'clock, at a castle in the neighbourhood of where we now write; the sound is immediately followed by the loud howling of the duke's hounds, rejoicing in the tinkling intimation that it is the breakfast hour. The priest at the altar rings the bell, and the mob goes forth and yells, because if they do not, they are well aware that he can deprive them of their morsel of bread-put them out of employment, and make them flee the land. Nor is this to be wondered at in such places as Cahir, where there are only some 250 nominal Protestants, out of a population of 7000. To the poor people the priests are in God's stead, they know that their craft is in danger, and "they are in great wrath because their time is short."

The degradation—the abject servility—and fiend-like ferocity of the people, thus instigated by priestly tyranny, is obviously another reason why we did not always succeed in the special object of our mission. So far from being prepared by any previous training to hear us, they were prepared-we had almost said compelled to resist us with all their might. In so far, at least, as open air preaching is concerned, we would certainly have been more successful in the west, and still more so in the north. Not that the writer regrets the mission to the south. The very opposite is the case. He glories in it; yea, even in its very failure, and in the fierce onslaught of its adversaries. Great good will flow from it. God chooses the foolish things of this world to confound the wise.

It were easy to condescend on some minor causes of failure, such as local jealousies, and rumours of our being government agents, paid to proselytise, but we forbear. Rather let us look for a little at the hopeful symptoms which came under our notice.

We affirm, then, after as careful observation as we could give to the subject, that, amongst many of the Romanists, even in the dark south, there is a secret reaction-a desire for information—a willingness to cheat the priest when they safely can-notwithstanding an apparent obedience to his dictum. The priests want no inquirers-no troublesome reasoners among the people-nothing but the most docile submission; but, notwithstanding the general show of external obedience, there are to be discovered, by a careful observer, some hopeful symptoms of inquiry. Take an illustration or two. If you offer a tract to a Romanist, in the presence of one or more witnesses, he will tear it to pieces, and grin in your face; but if you meet the same individual alone-if you come upon him when driving in your car along the road, and drop a tract or a Testament when he thinks no eye sees him, he will eagerly pick it up, and put it in his pocket. If a Scripture reader goes into a Roman Catholic house and takes out his Bible to read

they will in most cases refuse to listen, because the priest has forbidden them; but if he can recite the word of God, they will listen attentively,— thus evading, as they think, the priest's mandate. Again, if a Scripture reader goes into a house, and finds the wife there alone, she receives him gladly; if he returns next day and finds the husband alone, he is no less gratified with a visit; but let him go a third time, and find them both in the house, and he is instantly and fiercely expelled. The power of the priest and the confessional is there! Husband and wife are jealous of each other, and neither will do or say anything which the other might report against them at the next priestly scrutiny. Another illustration we cannot refrain from giving. A Protestant minister takes his stand in a Catholic village, and begins to pray. A few boys only are near, and they hastily run off-the prayer comes to a close, and, to his astonishment, the minister sees the boys running back towards him. He questions them, "Why did you run away? and why did you come back again?" "Sure, sir, the priest told us, when any of you came to pray or preach to us, we were to run off; but he didn't tell us not to come back again!" Here, then, we imagine that we discover indications that much of this fury may be as feigned as it is fierce-signs of an under-current, which we hope will soon take the place of the upper-current, and become a broad flowing stream. Railways-travellers—tracts— Bibles-and Scripture readers, all combined, are letting in light on the poor Romanists, despite all the craft and vigilance of their spiritual jailors. God speed the hour of emancipation!

What then is to be the issue of our visit? What results may be expected? What subsequent steps, if any, should be taken? It is a failure, say some— and, in a certain sense, we grant it is. Open air preaching has in most cases failed. But if by calling it a failure it is meant that no good will follow, we demur to the conclusion. The very bitterness, the unconstitutional hostility of our reception, will excite inquiry and cause investigation, which might not have followed had we been suffered in peace to preach the Gospel. Inquiry will be excited amongst the people, agitation all over the land, and investigation in high quarters, otherwise this is no longer fit to be called a free country, and British liberty is at the mercy of popish priests. It has done evil, say others. It may be so. Christ came not to send peace on earth but a sword. And where there has existed a false peace-where the lukewarm Protestant was living hand and glove with the popish priest-our visit may have disturbed that hollow truce, and troubled the stagnant waters. our own experience is this-whatever that of our brethren may have been— that in every case where the Protestant ministry, of any denomination, were doing their duty, they welcomed us with cordiality, and declared their conviction that good would follow.

But

One feeling must have been strengthened in the bosoms of all the hundred missionaries—a feeling of sympathy for our Protestant brethren in the south of Ireland-struggling for the defence and propagation of Gospel truth in the midst of such terrible difficulties. Let us pray for their safety and success. To the writer of this paper it appears, that whatever brethren from England or Scotland may henceforth do, in the way of occasional visits for consultation and inspection, the work of evangelizing Ireland must be carried on chiefly through NATIVE AGENCY. Best wherever it can be got, it is emphatically best among the Irish, for they are a peculiar people. Let us select and strengthen, or extend, some existing Irish mission, and by all means let us pour into the south a flood of Irish Scripture readers or reciters. Another thought presses upon us. We have hitherto been too general

and diffuse in our efforts against Irish popery. Let us concentrate _them now on one point. Let us remember that this is not Spain, nor France, nor Italy, but Britain; and let us put forth all our energy to break the POWER of the PRIESTS. Shall it be said that these craven-hearted cowards who shoot their arrows in the dark and keep out of shot range themselves-that the minions of a foreign despot-the hired creatures of an Italian ecclesiastic, are to be suffered by their denunciations to curtail the liberty and endanger the lives of peaceful British subjects with impunity? Shall it be said that these Maynooth men shall continue to receive British money only to be taught to defy British law? We must and we will have liberty to walk the streets of Tipperary in peace-liberty to speak our sentiments, secular or sacred, if we do not talk treason-and liberty, with our Bibles in our hands, to instruct those who are willing to hear us, unmolested by the myrmidons of priestcraft, otherwise British freedom has become a mere name, and priestism is the law of Ireland. Let there be an earnest crusade against the priests. Their power must be broken in the south as it has been in the north, and in some measure also in the west of Ireland. They are trembling for their stronghold. Let our motto be, "No truce and no compromise." Lately, in one of the disturbed districts, a number of the people met and resolved, that if any more of the inhabitants were shot, they, by way of reprisal, would shoot the priest! The effect was marvellous. There was no more thunder at the altar, and no more midnight murder. We counsel no such course. We have other weapons if we would but unite in using them. By the public press, by public meetings, by petitions to government, let us remonstrate against any unworthy concessions to these men-any attempt to govern Ireland through the priests-any continuance of public money to Maynooth. Persecution! This is none of it. Is it persecution, if a traveller has come into my house and shared my hospitality and forthwith begin to attack me-is it persecution for me to open the door and bid him walk out? Certainly not. Let Britain arise and break the power of these intolerant disturbers of the peace, and Ireland will no longer need an armed force of 38,000 men to maintain public tranquillity! Sir Robert Peel could do it. He set them a fighting with one another. Our whig governments try to please them, but they never can.

We had much more to say, but this paper is already too long, and we must reserve for a future one some remarks on the ancient religion of Irelandhow it received and how it lost a pure christianity; and also some observations on the alleged insult to the religion of the Irish people implied in the August mission.

Meanwhile let us look for careful deliberation, and earnest and united action on the part of the brethren who have been concerned in this mission, and all others who agree with them.

J. S. K.

THOUGHTS ON THE HARMONY BETWEEN THE SOUL AND

NATURE.

MANY are accustomed to think, that the forms of matter around us have no intrinsic relation to mind but the mere accident of juxta-position, if indeed we may speak of the juxta-position of matter and mind. This however is a very defective interpretation of nature. What, we may ask, is there in the external world that so awakens our susceptibilities, so stirs our feelings, yea