the working of this institute, of an amount of bitterness and jealousy, and hatred of things as they are, which I had not before suspected in its full extent. And people go on saying, Peace, peace, when there is no peace!" " The address was delivered on Monday, October 23, 1848. It was listened to with deep admiration and attention. It was so eloquent; the voice and manner with which it was de I do not think I am at all the man that should be selected. They should have some one of standing and influence in the town, and I am almost a stranger; and my taking so prominent a position might fairly be construed into assumption. Again, I am much afraid that my name might do them harm rather than good. They wish not to be identified at all with party politics and party religion; and I fear that in min is of very many of the more influential in-livered were so thrilling, the earnestness and habitants of the town my name being made conspicuous would be a suspicious circumstance. It is my conviction that an address from me would damage their cause. For though the institution is intended to be self supporting, yet there is no reason why it should wilfully throw away its chances of assistance from the richer classes, and I am quite sure that of these very many, whether reasonably or unreasonably, are prejudiced against me, and perhaps the professedly religious portion of society most strongly Now, I do think this is a point for very serious consideration, and I think it ought to be distinctly suggested to the committee before I can be in a position to comply with or decline complying with their request. Besides this, I believe they have erred in their estimate of my mental calibre. I wish most earnestly, for their own sakes, that they would select a better 80. deep belief of the speaker in all that he said were so impressive, that men said the words seemed imprinted on their characters forever. It was moreover a brave and noble speech, more brave and noble than can be easily understood at present. Fifteen years ago the feelings and opinions on the social relations of the upper and lower ranks of society, which are common now, were very uncommon, especially, on the lips of clergymen. The elevation of the working classes,' meant to most men at that time, the destruction of the aristocracy and the monarchy: to own any sympathy with a Chartist. was to acknowledge one's self a dangerous character to speak of the wrongs of the laboring men was to initiate a revolution: to use the words liberty, equality, and fraternity,' and to say that they had a meaning and a truth in them, was to that large class of persons to whom terms have only one meaning and truth only one side,-to whom error is error and nothing more, teaching which was perilous in a poli"I am anxious to enlist your sympathy in tician, but almost impious in a clergyman. Supthe cause which I am trying to assist The ported by his faith in truth, Mr. Robertson case is this. About 1,100 workingmen in this cared for none of these things. He taught the town have just organized themselves into an as- right, and left the seed to its own vitality. It sociation which, by a small weekly subscription, cost him ease and finally his life to speak, but enables them to have a library and reading- he would not be silent. The misunderstanding room. Their proceedings hitherto have been and censure which he incurred stung him marked by singular judgment and caution, ex- acutely, but could not sting him into faithlesscept in one point, that they have unexpect-ness to duty. He did not seek for martyrdom: edly applied to me to give them an opening address. man." The following letter written to Lady Henly gives an account of his hopes and fears: A large number of these are intelligent Chartists, and there is some misgiving in a few minds as to what will be the result of this movement, and some suspicion of its being only a political engine. My reasous for being anxious about this effort are these, it will be made. The workingmen have as much right to a library and reading room as the gentlemen at Folthorp's or the tradesmen at the Athenæum. The only question is, whether it shall be met warmly on our parts, or with that coldness which deepens the suspicion, already rankling in the lower classes, that their superiors are willing for them to improve so long as they themselves are allowed to have the leading-strings. The selection of books for the library is a matter of very great importance; as I have become aware, since getting a little insight into few men have ever shrunk more painfully from publicity; but he steadfastly resolved to fulfil his work and bear his cross. One class, though for a long time suspicious, received his words with joy, and hailed him as a faithful friend. The workingmen of Brighton felt that, at last, a minister of the Church of England had entered into their aspirations and their wrongs." "The whole address may be described as an effort to destroy the errors of socialistic theories, not by denouncing them, but by holding forth the truths which lay beneath them, and gain them their vitality: to show that these truths were recognized in Christianity and placed there upon a common ground-where the various classes of society could meet and merge their differences in sympathy and love." The labors of Robertson among the poor, and his intense desire to rescue the fallen and degraded, gained for him the entire confidence. of the laboring classes. He did not despise those who had been reared in ignorance and surrounded by the most unfavorable circumstances, but through all their degradation he beheld the ruins of a noble nature, which, by Christian sympathy and judicious training, might be led to the knowledge of heavenly truth. To the Editors of Friends' Intelligencer. DEAR FRIENDS :-The calls to duty are of daily occurrence with you as well as with me, but the painfully pressing needs of many entire tribes call now for earnest care, because it does not admit of delay. If what I have written is not opportune, I must implore you to raise a voice in the Indians behalf. I have written under a sense of deep responsibility, and O shall the appeal be in vain. Your sincere friend, SIDNEY AVERILL. AN APPEAL. "His rule of life was not 'Crush what is natural,' but Walk in the spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh.' Far above all other motives was his love to Christ. That was the root of his life, and the life of all his effort. It was a conscious, personal, realized devotion. It was too hallowed a feeling for him to speak There is, looming up in the Western horizon, much of. It colored and pervaded every the appalling portent of a war of extermination thought; was an unceasing presence with him; of the scattered tribes-the original owners of lay at the foundation of every endeavor, and was a vast territorial domain. The Indian, though brought to bear on every action in life, on every artful as a warrior, appears to be destitute of book he read, and almost on every word he spoke. reflection, and blind to consequences; the plan Temptations and doubts he strove to solve he takes to elude his pursuers imperil his wife by working among the poor. The indulging in and children. The indulging in and children. For his pale faced enemy, there mere aspirations he would not permit himself is but one way to conquer him, and that is to he freed his ideal world from its atmosphere of destroy the Indian lodges in the covert absence sloth and vague cloud land, by putting, as far of the warriors. To fall without mercy upon as he could, his aspirations into action. No the defenceless, though opposed to every sentiwork was too small for him. He did not de- ment of justice, will be impleaded as a needful spise the dullest intellect; and was fair, patient, element in this general massacre. and gentle in argument, even with the intoler- of Friends may not stay the tide of vengeance; The Society ant. He listened to a child with interest and but it is believed they can divert it into a consideration. Somehow, he reached the most peaceful course. They have, on behalf of the dense in a Sunday-school class. He led the Indians, a great and growing influence with the children to elaborate for themselves the thought Government. A committee representing all the he wished to give them, and to make it their Friends in America, would not appeal in vain. own. No pains or patience were spared in doing A carefully written and impartial account of the this. It was strange to see so fiery a nature causes which have led to the Indian atrocities, drudging on so meekly, and gently, and perse- will disclose beyond a doubt the darkest chapveringly, content to toil at striking sparks out ter that has ever disgraced the annals of a of apparently hopeless clay. But untiring ear greedy speculation. And we should, in justice nestness and unflinching resolution in duty to the poor Indian, examine the wrongs which made him do all things as in God's sight." drive him on to desperation. It is not too much to say, that the ultimate guilt of every fiendish outrage upon the western plains, lies not at the door of the wigwam, but at the trail or ranch innocent blood, or if the deep, dark guilt fall of the white man. To prevent the shedding of upon our nation that we may escape its stain, are we not called to act in the ability which He gives who hears the cry of every outcast race; To be continued. for of one blood He has made all nations. S. A. "In passing judgment upon the characters of men we ought to try them by the principles and maxims of their own age, not by those of an other, for although virtue and vice are at all times the same, manners and customs vary continually. Some parts of Luther's behaviour, which appear to us most culpable, gave no dis' gust to his cotemporaries. It was even by some of those qualities, which we are now apt to blame, that he was fitted for accomplishing the If you depend for water on a pond that is great work which he undertook. To rouse man only filled by thunder-storms, you will often kind when sunk in ignorance or superstition, want water; but if you have a conduit that and to encounter the rage of bigotry armed brings in water from a deep and ever-flowing with power, required the utmost vehemence of fountain, you never want. Human feelings and zeal as well as a temper daring to excess. A excitement, and emotions created by appeals to gentle call would neither have reached nor ex- our feelings, may produce a temporary action, cited those to whom it was addressed. A spirit but it is only the soul which is actually more amiable, but less vigorous than Luther's," joined to the Lord" by a true and living would have shrunk back from the dangers fuith, which he braved and surmounted."-Cyclope- Christ, who supplies that strength, can never that never wants strength, because dia of English Literature. fail. . HOW TO BE HAPPY. "Sometime since," says Dr. Payson in a letter to a young clergyman," "I took up a little work purporting to be the lives of sundry characters as related by themselves. Two of these characters agreed in remarking that they were never happy until they ceased striving to be great men. This remark struck me, as you know the most simple remarks will strike us when heaven pleases. It occurred to me at once that the most of my sufferings and sorrows were occasioned by an unwillingness to be nothing, which I am, and by consequent strug gles to be something. I saw if I would cease struggling, and consent to be anything or nothing, just as God pleases, I might be happy You will think it strange that I mention this as a new discovery. In one sense it was not new; I had known it for years. But I now saw it in a new light. My heart saw it and consented to it; I am comparatively happy. My dear brother, if you can give up all desire to be great, and feel heartily willing to be nothing, you will be happy too." For Friends' Intelligencer. THE SABBATH QUESTION. Review of "A Reply to the REV. DR. GEO. JUNKIN'S Treatise, entitled, Sabbatismos, by JUSTIN MARTYR. T. ELLWOOD ZELL, Publisher. Philada., 1867." The use of passenger cars in the streets of our large cities has of late years brought prominently before the public the question, How far is the observance of the first day of the week, as a day of rest, obligatory upon Christians? Among the publications that have been issued relating to this subject, the work of which the title ap pears at the head of this article is deemed worthy of attention, as an able exposition of liberal views. The author informs us in his Preface that at one time he held the same views upon "the Sabbath Question," popularly so called, as those entertained by the author of "Sabbatismos," but when he came to examine the subject, he was "surprised to find how much has been assumed as undeniable, without even the semblance of a proof; how much, he regrets to say, was disingenuously explained; how much apparently wilfully misunderstood; and how much suppressed. When the treatise under review came under his notice, he found that it abounded, to a greater extent than any he had seen, with the same gratuitous assumptions, and some of the other shortcomings to which he has just referred. And as it was written with the avowed purpose of affecting public opinion upon the religious unlawfulness of running street cars on the first day of the week, and as no one seemed disposed to reply to it, the writer, whose convictions were the result of much deliberation, and, as he trusts, of candid and unbiassed investigation, determined to do so." He says, "The wish of those who favor the removal of the restriction is not to abolish the Sabbath." It is "to abolish a legal restriction which exists, but which is based upon a religious restriction which has ceased to exist." "The freedom which Boston in this respect enjoys has not, that we have ever heard, injured the morals of that city, nor is there in consequence any wish to abolish the Sabbath; nor are worldly avocations pursued to any greater degree than before; nor do those who leave the city, for the purer air of the country, appear to return in the sad condition which our author describes, namely, 'battered, bruised and bloody.' The advocates of restriction who thus endeavor to arouse passions and alarm prejudices cannot be sincere, or they would not by their own example violate the law as it now stands, or countenance its violation in others. Their own conduct shows their insincerity, for they claim for themselves. The whole question is are not willing to accord the liberty which they resolved into this: Is the fourth commandment now morally binding?" The first four chapters of this work are devoted to the examination of the question whether the fourth commandment, relating to the keeping of the Seventh day as a Sabbath, is a part of the moral law; that is, the law made known in the conscience and binding upon all mankind. Many eminent authorities are quoted to prove that this commandment was restricted to the Jews, and not binding on Christians. If the ground taken by the author of Sabbatismos can be maintained, that the fourth commandment is a part of the moral law, and intended to be perpetually binding on all nations, it necessarily follows that it must be kept in all its strictness, and that no human authority can transfer its obligations from the seventh to the first day of the week. No one claims, however, that it should be kept now with the strictness enjoined by Moses and formerly practised by the Jews, nor can it be shown that any precept of Christ or his apostles has transferred its observance to the first day of the week. We have the testimony of the evangelists showing that their Lord and Master did not keep the Sabbath with the strictness practised by the Jews; and when the Pharisees complained that his disciples violated the law in this respect, he replied that "the Sabbath was made for mau, and not man for the Sabbath." The alleged change of the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week rests upon the assumption that because the disciples met for divine worship on First day,-being the day of Christ's resurrection, therefore it became the Christian Sabbath, in the same sense that the seventh day was the Jewish Sabbath. Yet rest; he merely advocates a reasonable and liberal construction or amendment of the law, in order to adapt it to the wants of the community. The setting apart of one day in seven as a time of cessation from labor and secular business has been found by experience a salutary custom, in the author of Sabbatismos says, "We admit that any other day" [than Sunday]-" Tuesday, Thursday, if agreed upon over the whole country -would do as well." If the day may rightfully be changed by human authority, it is obvious that the manner of observing it may, by the same authority, be adapted to the wants and invigorating both the mind and the body, connocent enjoyments of the people. tributing to special enjoyment, and affording an opportunity for religious retirement or public worship. Our author has devoted a chapter to the three principal texts bearing upon this question, in the Epistles of Paul. In the first of these How welcome must be the return each week texts, (Rom. xiv. 5, 6,) the Apostle teaches the of this season of rest to the care worn merchant, largest charity in regard to the observance of the overwearied artisan, and the domestic emdays; in the second, (Gal. iv. 10, 11,) he ex-ployed in household drudgery. If any of these presses his fears of a Judaizing spirit: "Ye observe days and months and times and years. I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain;" in the third, (Col. ii. 16, 17,) he exhorts them to maintain their Christian liberty: "Let no man therefore judge you in meat or in drink, or in respect of a holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days, which are a shadow of things to come, but the body is of Christ." Sabbatarian writers have found these texts exceedingly difficult to deal with, and the author of Sabbatismos, while omitting some verses, glosses over others, and maintains that the Sab bath days alluded to by the Apostle were the "annual Sabbaths," or Sabbatical years, when the land was left without culture. find it conducive to their health or relaxation to seek the fresh air of the country on this their only leisure day, why should the facilities of the street cars be denied them, while the affluent in their craches are permitted to drive through all the streets of the city and to travel in the country without restriction? To the infirm and the aged who live at a distance from their places of worship in the city, the use of the street cars would be a great convenience. In relation to the Sabbath Question, Boston and Philadelphia seemed to have changed places; the former metropolis of the pilgrims having become the centre of liberal ideas, while the city of Brotherly Love has succumbed to the sway of the Puritans. The bock is neatly printed on good paper. S. M. J. THE STILL BEAUTY OF NATURE. If there could be some splendid confusion produced amid the serenity of the present universal order; if some broad constellation should begin to-night to play off from all its lamps volleys of Bengal lights, that should fall in showers of many-colored sparks and fiery ser In his tenth chapter our author has brought forward a formidable array of distinguished Reformers to show that the Sabbath was exclusively a Jewish institution not binding on us. "We have," he says, "in support of this view the testimony of Luther, Calvin, Melancthon, Beza, Bucer, Zuinglius, Cranmer. Ridley, Frith, Knox, Chil ingworth, Jeremy Taylor, Baxter, Barrow, Milton, Barclay, Limbouch, and in more recent times, of Paley, of Arnold of Rug-pents down the spaces of the heavens; or if by, Whateley, Robertson of Brighton. In America, that of Bishop White, the Rev. Dr. James Alexander, &c. &c." Luther says, "The Gospel regardeth neither Sabbath nor holidays, because they endured but for a time, and were ordained for the sake of preaching, to the end that God's word might be tended and taught." some blazing and piratical comet should butt and jostle the whole outworks of a system, and rush like a celestial fire ship, destroying order, and kindling the calm fleets that sail upon the infinite azure into a flame, how many thousands there are that would look up to the skies for the first time with wonder and awe, and exclaim inwardly: "Surely there is the finger of God." They do not see anything surprising or subdu ing in the punctual rise and steady setting of the sun, and its imperial and boundless bounty; and yet there is enough fire in the sun to spirt any quantity of flaming and fantastic jets; it could fill the whole space between Mercury and Neptune with brilliant pyrotechnics and jubilee displays, such as children gaze at and clap their It is gratifying to find that, in the work hands. But the great old sun is not selfish, before us, the author, while exposing the fallacy and has no French ambition for such tawdry of the arguments advanced by Sabbatarians. glories. It reserves its fires, keeps them stored does not propose to dispense with the observ-in its breast, spills over no sheets of flame ance of the first day of the week as a day of from its high caldron, but shoots still and In his last chapter, entitled, "The Quaker and the Puritan," the author points out the wise liberality of the former, and the rigid in tolerance of the latter. Penn and his friends, while abstaining from secular business on the first day of the week, did not regard it as being holier than other days, nor did they observe it in the manner of the New England Puritans. 1 steadily its clean, white beams into the ether; | am afflicted and ready to die from my youth God knows what keys in the human soul to touch in order to draw out its sweetest and most perfect harmonies. They may be the minor strains of sadness and sorrow; they may be the loftier notes of joy and gladness; God knows where the melodies of our nature are, and what discipline will call them forth. Some with plaintive songs must walk in lowly vales all life's weary way; others in loftier hymns shall sing of nothing but joy as they tread the mountain tops of life; but they all unite without a discord or a jar, as the ascending anthem of loving and believing hearts finds its way into the chorus of the redeemed in heaven. "Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and thou hast afflicted me with thy waves.' "Hath God forgotten to be gracious? Is His mercy clean gone forever; and will IIe be favorable no more?" Or, with Luther, "Lord, where art thou? My God, where art thou? Come, I pray thee. I will not let thee go. And, though the world should be througed with devils, and this body be cast forth, trodden under foot, cut in pieces, consumed to ashes, my soul is thine. My soul belongs to thee, and I will abide with thee forever. Amen. 0 God, send help." Thus he is weaned from earth, and driven to God as his only and last resort. soul. his be "all sufficient good, His portion and his choice." This prayer cannot but be pleasing and acceptable to God; and, if it indicate the prevailing temper and desire of the heart, will assuredly be answered. But the answer may come by a process he little expects. He may look for it as the result of some direct divine influence upon the soul. But this is not God's usual method of grace. The soul must needs go through a disciplinary process to be purified and etherealized; and may be at the time unconscious of the divine influence by which the proce s is directed. "He leadeth the blind by a way he knew not." He who offers this prayer may presently find himself interrupted in his worldly prosperity. His schemes for accumulation are frustrated. The "fields may yield no meat, the flocks be cut off from the fold, and there be no herds in the stalls." Poverty may stare him in the face; friends may prove recreant; the dear ones of his family may be stricken, and sickness and death may invade the domestic circle. II is reputation among men may suffer, his conduct be questioned, his motives impugued, and his name be cast out as evil;" innumerable | evils may press upon and almost crush him, till he cries out, "O Lord, why castest thou off my soul? Why hidest thou thy face from me? I "God is the refuge of his soul When storms of dark distress invade." His prayer is answered.-By and by the clouds break away, and light breaks in upon his He now sees that what appeared to him as altogether adverse and mysterious was for his best good. True, in his darkness and trouble, like good old Jacob, he had said, “ All these things are against me." But, now that he sees "the end of the Lord," he is satisfied, as was Jacob, that they were all for him-that the fiery trials through which he had been led were necessary to purge away the dross from his soul. He now thinks of the "goodness" as well as the "severity of God," and remembers with gratitude all "the way in which the Lord hath led him," and he goes on his way rejoicing and singing, "I love the Lord, Because he hath heard my voice and my supplica tions, Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, Therefore will I call upon him as long as I live. The sorrows of death compassed me, The pains of hell got hold upon me, I found trouble and sorrow, Then called I upon the name of the Lord, REFLECTIONS. 1. Because we do not always receive a prompt and literal answer to our prayers, we are not to infer thence that God disregards them. He may have a way of answering more worthy of himself, and far better for us, which he will reveal in due time. 2. The attainment of holiness may involve the necessity for great trials and afflictions. If we would have our prayers to this end answered, let us be prepared to pass through fiery trials. 3. We must not be deterred from praying for holiness on this account. "For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh |