of the age that nothing could be finer, and that there was no greater treat, than to hear Milner, when he fairly gave himself to an argument, pouring out the treasures of his rich and magnificent mind.

In this respect the two brothers were singularly contrasted. If any confidence may be placed in early recollections, Joseph Milner had by no means a ready command of language: with great knowledge, and a retentive memory, and a love of truth never surpassed, and a capacity perhaps little if at all inferior to that of his brother for arriving at a just conclusion in all such matters as his previous studies had qualified him to discuss, he would have found a difficulty in delivering, vivá voce, his opinions, however well digested; and instead of overwhelming you with a force of strength and a torrent of eloquence, like the Dean, would in all likelihood have left you in doubt whether he were not to be classed among second-rate combatants.

Of this learned, and good, and able man-for such he was-let it be permitted to one who still cherishes his memory with affectionate respect, to take this opportunity of saying a few words, not without reference to many that have been said against him.

It has been the fashion of late years to represent him as a person little qualified for writing the History of the Church of Christ, by reason of his daily engagements. "What time had he, amidst the incessant occupations of his Grammar School, and his public and private clerical duties, to read original Church writers; and what means had he, in the commercial town of Hull, far away from Episcopal, and Cathedral, and University libraries, for procuring the necessary works?" Now what were his habits as Master of the Grammar School?

He generally came in about nine in the morning: at eleven the school was dismissed; the scholars went to learn writing and arithmetic elsewhere. The afternoon school hours were from two till five in the summer, and till four in the winter, months. He was generally present during the whole of the afternoon. Thursday afternoon, and the whole of Saturday, were regular holidays. The holidays at Christmas and Midsummer were not less than three months. So that for about nine months in the year he was in the school weekly about twenty-two hours. And with these hours the labours of the school ended. What might have been required of him during the early years of his Mastership, the writer is ignorant; but during the latter years, he certainly had no oecasion to read a single exercise, or to prepare himself in any respect for the lessons of the following day. And in point of fact it is scarcely too much to affirm that he never did so. His Lectureship at Lister's Hospital-a small Hospital very near the school-was not more frequent than once a week it occupied about an hour. His Lectureship at the High Church, also very near the school, required a sermon every Sunday afternoon, and another on the alternate Wednesdays. For the Wednesdays he did not always (if ever) think it necessary to write one. At his living of Ferriby he was in the habit of preaching every Sunday morning; and about two o'clock he might generally have been seen riding on his quiet horse into Hull to be ready for the afternoon service. This, let it be repeated, applies to at least the latter years of his life.

Now it is no unreasonable supposition that he frequently preached at Hull the same sermon in the afternoon which he had preached at Ferriby in the morning; and he was known-although slow of speech— to have the pen of a ready writer. Is it a groundless supposition that the writing of his sermons cost him not more than six hours a week?

The prevailing belief of his scholars was that they were written on Saturdays. It does not follow that he did not previously consider his subjects. He was much in the habit, in intervals of leisure during school hours, to walk slowly up and down that noble school-room : and often might he have been seen taking from his pocket his little well-used Bible, and turning to a passage, and then restoring the book to its place. Was he not thinking of his sermons?

It may be said here, that no account is taken of the time which he might have employed in visiting the sick, in receiving friends at dinner at his own house, or in dining at theirs, &c. &c. The reply is very easy. Mr. Milner's Lectureship did not involve parochial visits; and, in point of fact, it was in those days not so much the custom, as in the present, to include this visiting among a clergyman's important obligations. That he never visited a sick person, it would be too much to affirm; but to judge of him in this respect, or of the more conscientious clergy of his time in general, by modern usage, would very often lead us into error.

As to dinners, visiting, &c. it may be doubted whether Mr. Milner ever had a guest; he lived chiefly with his aged mother in almost absolute retirement. And very little was the time which he consumed in visiting others. That he once dined out, may be inferred from an anecdote as to a matter of etiquette, which proved that he was not much accustomed to the usages of society; and that he once drank tea with a family in the town, is recollected from the circumstance of its being mentioned at the time as a remarkable event. It is not, however, meant to be affirmed that these were solitary instances: and it is possible that after the settlement in Hull of his valued friend, the Rev. T. Dikes-happily for the town, still living, and, at the age of fourscore, still pursuing his useful and honourable course- Mr. M. may have lived less in seclusion; but enough has been said to shew that there was at least no want of leisure for prosecuting the work by which his name is to be handed down to future ages.

And there was no want of scholarship; it was not by trifling that the poor, unbefriended A. B. of Catherine Hall gained a classical medal. There is now, it may be justly affirmed, no place of education in the world where the poorest and most unbefriended student will be more secure of being rewarded, if he deserves it, than the University of Cambridge. But if old legends may be trusted, in Joseph Milner's days it was not so. But where was he to get books? It is said that our early Newspapers, under the head of Foreign News, began generally with Yorkshire. But towards the close of the last century Yorkshire had ceased to be a sort of "terra incognita," and Hull was a well-known seaport. There were even booksellers in the place; and these men had correspondents in London; while Joseph Milner's own brother was President of a college in Cambridge. Was it very difficult in such circumstances to procure the works wanted by a Church historian at Hull? If the President of Queen's College had access to all the libraries of Cambridge, did he never avail himself of the opportunity to procure the required volumes for his brother?-a brother for whom, as is well-known, he entertained the most tender affection, and in whose work he felt the deepest interest? He has even avowed himself as the author of one chapter, written and published during his brother's life time; and there are not wanting those who can speak of the anxiety which he manifested (at least after his brother's death) to procure from the Continent certain

works which he could not find in England, and of amusing circumstances connected with the correspondence which he kept up for that purpose.

On the whole, if Joseph Milner fell into any inaccuracies of statement, it was not from want of integrity-for in him there was no guile, and his love of truth was supreme; nor from want of scholarship; nor from want of leisure; nor from want of studious habits and patient research; nor from want of books. His errors, if any there be, arose from the extreme difficulty of ascertaining facts correctly; and his defective statements, if any should be found, are in all likelihood to be principally traced to the peculiar and avowed plan of his history. It had a distinct design: and he deliberately, and wisely, cast aside, or noticed very slightly, what did not come within his province.

But to return to the Dean. It will readily be believed that a man of his extraordinary talent and ardent thirst for knowledge, must, long before the close oflife, have acquired very various and extensive information; but it would be difficult for persons who were unacquainted with him to believe how perfectly he seemed to be at home on almost every subject to which conversation might be directed. Whether it were the most abstruse question in Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, or the best method of shoeing a horse ;-whatever were the subject, he seemed to have given to it full attention, He appeared to be in this respect always at home; and seldom did he hear of anything new, which was likely either to be useful for the common purposes of life, or was on other grounds entitled to consideration, which did not form the object of immediate inquiry. The extensive information to which he was thus perpetually making additions, and his pleasant mode of imparting it as occasion required, and his rich fund of anecdote, and the knowledge which he had acquired concerning nearly all the great men of his time, rendered him assuredly, both to young and aged persons, one of the most attractive companions to be met with. It was often remarked that he would probably not enlighten the world by his writings in any degree equal to the expectation which might justly be formed concerning a man of such mental powers and such stores of information: he has, however, left enough to vindicate his title to a high place among his distinguished countrymen, and it may be doubted whether there be not future publications from his manuscripts still in reserve. For some years his conversation was often directed to the Eleventh Section of the Principia : he spoke of it as not yet fully explained or understood: and upon one hearer at least he left the impression that he was writing in illustration of it. Are any manuscripts of his on this subject in existence?

POPISH MARIOLATRY.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

THE idolatry of the Romish Church, in exalting the Virgin Mary among the other saints to whom it offers Divine worship-and that, not as demonstrable only from the missals of monastic antiquity, but from the latest Service books of that apostate church-was sufficiently shewn in the notes to a sermon in your January Number. However clearly the fact may be proved-as it has been in innumerable instances down to this moment-the command of "Answer him not" is now more than ever pursued as the policy of Rome in respect of this error-however

gross-as of kindred errors, which are equally unscriptural and revolting. The Church of Rome-assured that where the Bible is practically a prohibited book, her claim of sacerdotal authority must needs pass current with any laity which is content to wear the shackles of a corrupt hierarchy-now less frequently than ever, enters the field of public controversy, on account of the certainty of being easily defeated; but she does not the less continue to assert her oft refuted absurdities, and to multiply those converts who are resolved to escape the trouble of thinking for themselves, and to purchase heaven on the easiest terms. Much of our modern literature is now favouring the growing delusion in favour of large and liberal concessions to error. At their head may perhaps be classed what was once not untruly called "the leading journal of Europe," now become, more or less, a vehicle for the gradual diffusion of Popery without the Church, and of a modern heresy within it, which is a mere modification of that early apostacy. The Athenæum, which has long made a scoff at religion, is, in like manner, duly observant of those "coming events which cast their shadows before ;" and wisely catering to the refined taste of the scientific public, is not careful to distinguish between things that differ in another school than that of art. Thus on the 26th November last, we have what is called the “ touching account of the ceremony of inaugurating a chapel to the memory of the victims of the Versailles Railway accident;" without a word of reprobation on this chapel being erected for praying their souls out of purgatory-much less on the Patron Saint of the chapel being the Virgin Mary, under the title of "Notre Dame des flammes,' "Our Lady of the flames;" because (as will be remembered) these unhappy Sunday travellers were consumed by fire. A figure of the Virgin not only, it seems, surmounts the chapel; but there is a second statue of her above the altar, beneath which are the words, "Oh good and tender Mary! preserve us from the flames of earth! still more from those of eternity!" as if any mere creature in heaven or on earth possessed any power of this nature, or were needed for such an end, when only the sacred Persons of the ever blessed Trinity are proper objects of Divine worship, as alone possessing the incommunicable attributes of the Deity, and when Jehovah has expressly declared that he "will not give his glory to another." It appears that "the relatives of the victims were present in great numbers, joining in the mass for the dead, and the surrounding banks were crowded with silent and sympathizing spectators." And what instruction, I would ask, is, at this period of the world's age, to be found by "sympathizing spectators," or what consolation by sorrowing survivors, in the celebration of an unauthorized and uncommanded musical spectacle, declarative of a separate, but not a final, state of being, for the proof of which we look in vain from the beginning to the end of all canonical Scripture? And what, after all, is this supposed presidency of the Virgin over the ravages of fire, but a simple modification of ancient heathenism, which equally assigned to her profane rabble of gods and goddesses just such a supernatural controul over the elements, and other creatures of the Almighty, as our poor ignorant neighbours are here taught by their clergy to refer to the Virgin Mary-herself no other than a creature, however honoured by all nations, as the earthly mother of our blessed Lord?

ZENAS.

ON THE SEPARATION OF BOYS AND GIRLS IN SCHOOLS.
To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

Glasgow, 8th Feb. 1843. SIR, Since I took the liberty of sending you a few slips the other day, I have had the pleasure of perusing your last publication. I do not desire any controversy on the subject of the separation of the sexes in education, nor do I ask you to occupy your valuable columns with the subject; but I would simply remark, that I conceive it dangerous for boys and girls to be taught together beyond the age of seven or eight, but not so to be trained even up to the age of twelve or fourteen ;—i. e. a school without the constant moral superintendance of the master is dangerous; but with it, as under the Training system which I advocate and practise, it is not only perfectly safe, but highly improving, morally and intellectually, to both sexes. It is a fact, that out of a regular attendance of 500 to 600 children of both sexes in the four Model Schools and Play-grounds, under four masters, and consisting of children of from two to fourteen years of age-one of these being from the wealthy classes the utmost propriety has been exhibited, and the greatest improvement taken place. I state this as a fact; and under the same system, with well-trained masters, similar results would take place in England.

I know well the "prejudice" that exists in the South on this point, and I quite sympathize with it. It must continue until the opposite course be tried.

It is also a fact, that no evil has resulted from the young men and women (students) who have been trained for two thirds of each day together. Under the teaching system, I believe it would be exceedingly dangerous and inexpedient; but this is no reason why the training system should not be attempted. The whole principle is-begin early, and continue to train at all hazards (for hazard there actually is none) up to the age of twelve or thirteen years. Most certainly I would not for the first time "mix two or three hundred young ladies of the higher classes of society with the young gentlemen of their own age and station at Eton, Winchester, and Harrow, or at Oxford and Cambridge, assigning them the same class-rooms, galleries, and play-grounds;" but had these young gentlemen been trained from infancy, not merely taught, with girls of the same age, their manners would now have been much better, their moral sense much more alive, and the young ladies would certainly be safer in private life with these young gentlemen than they are at present. These are truths true to nature, and which I believe must germinate and grow as parts of real moral training.

Our model of school training is the family; and with that I leave you to judge of the probable results of such a system as we advocate, having as one of its principles the training of boys and girls together as God intended them in the family. Parents are bound to train their children at all times, personally, or by proxy. Can rich or poor accomplish this otherwise than by proxy? What we recommend and exhibit as a model is, that the public school-trainer be that proxy.

I am weekly in receipt of letters from clergymen and others from all parts of England, complaining of the difficulty of finding man and wife, or brother and sister, as teachers for their Boys and Girls' schools. The wife, from family circumstances, is oftentimes unable to fulfil the du