FEAR OF DEATH.-It has always seemed strange to me, that men who believe in the realities of heaven, and who profess to have made their peace with God, should be afraid to die. Very few, like St. Paul, long to go hence. Why is it? True we see men overwhelmed with misfortune, or grief, who court death. But as long as a person retains a sana mens in sano corpore, so long, as a general rule, he desires to live, even when all his loved ones have gone before him. To me, this is incomprehensible. Either the man is a hypocrite, who expresses such high expectations of heaven, and yet fears to die, or God has implanted in his animal nature a fear of death which he can not overcome, as a means of preserving earthly life for wise purposes: for with the joys of heaven in view, who could afford to live upon earth did not animal nature actually chain him here? PAINS OF DEATH.-Many learned men concur in the idea, that the pains of death are not near so great as they frequently seem. I am inclined to agree with them in this conclusion. In February, 1864, my oldest child, a daughter, then twelve years old, was stricken down with that most terrible of all diseases, cerebro-spinal meningitis. For one week she seemed to have the most terrible of all headaches, and convulsion after convulsion followed in quick succession. I VOL. IV.-No. 1. 31 ESQ. thought that, all this time, my child was suffering excruciating agony. At the end of the week, the invalid seemed miraculously recovering-snatched, as it were, from the very jaws of death. From being delirious, and seemingly racked with pain, she became rational, and with no appearance of suffering. One day, in my absence from the room, some one told her how low she had been. When I returned and took my seat by the bed-side, she said: "Father, I didn't know I had been so sick:"-and went on to talk about her case. She knew she had had a bad head-ache, but was not conscious of any thing else. She probably was conscious of the head-ache of the first stages of the disease, but likely felt no pain during the subsequent stages, though she really seemed to be in great agony during her almost constant convulsions, and continually emitted the heart-rending moans peculiar to the disease that attacked her. After the delusive tale of hope, that almost always comes with an intermission of the violent symptoms of the disease of which I speak, still more violent convulsions, and apparently still more excruciating suffering came, and my daughter died. If there could be any consolation in that dark hour, besides the hope which heaven gives, it was the testimony which my child had bornethat she was not conscious of suffering during the severe paroxysms alluded to. (485) Mexicans and Maximilian are engaged in a little bloody set-to, and Bismarck and Napoleon are threatening each other with the sword, and the Western Indians and the Federal troops are scalping and burning each other's women and children, as well as each other, and so it goes. war. Whilom we had a goodly number of Peace Societies-particularly in New Englandflourishing among the American people, though we have not heard of one since 1860. But it is very interesting to know what so distinguished and able a New England divine as Dr. Channing used to say on the subject of Honor in War. The Doctor, on this subject, did once discourse as follows: "The idea of honor is associated with But to whom does the honor belong? If to any, certainly not to the mass of the people, but to those who are particularly engaged in it. The mass of a people, who stay at home and hire others to fight, who sleep in their warm beds and hire others to sleep on the cold and damp earth, who sit at their well-spread board and hire others to take the chance of starving, who nurse the slightest hurt in their own bodies, and hire others to expose themselves to mortal wounds, and to linger in comfortless hospitals, certainly this mass reap little honor from war. The honor belongs to those who immediately engage in it. Let me ask, then, what is the chief business of war? It is to destroy human life, to man IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL.-Man longs in deadly conflict with the Turks, and the for immortality, and yet immortality is a fearful, awful thing. To wish to die, and yet not be able to die-what is more solemn | than this thought? He who reasons, and requires the proof of every thing he believes, can not be certain that the soul is immortal. He who implicitly believes every thing in the Bible, and blindly follows faith, instead of reason, is certain (in his own mind) that the soul is immortal: I say he is certain (in his own mind) that the soul is immortal, whether it actually be so or not. But he who regards the enunciations in the Bible concerning man's immortality in the same light that he does the arguments of Plato in favor of the same conclusion, will always doubt. And yet the same skeptic will take counsel of his own longings, and hope, if he does not believe in man's immortality, though he is not certain of it. The doctrine that the soul is immortal, is incomprehensible. Man can no more understand it than a child can | understand Trigonometry. He can no more understand it than he can understand God. For me to fully comprehend a man, I must be the equal of that man. If man understood God, he would no longer be man, but a God. And as he can not understand God, so he can not yet understand that infinity-his own immortality-which is so much like God. And yet man must be immortal. There are impulses in the human heart whose throbs are felt right up by the throne of Deity. There are Divine breathings some-gle the limbs, to gash and hew the body, to times showered down upon man which elevate him to heaven, and he can then walk and talk with God. Man must be immortal. Of what avail are all his joys and sorrowsall his pains and all his pleasures, if this be not so? Where is there a broken link in God's universe? Where one, particularly in the material world? And if there be none in the material, why any in the moral world? Are the impulses of the heartman's hopes and man's aspirations all to be quenched in the grave? It can not be so. The chain can not be so broken. Every throb of the heart is but a link in the chain that encircles eternity. plunge the sword into the heart of a fellowcreature, to strew the earth with bleeding frames and to trample them under foot with horses' hoofs. It is to batter down and burn cities, to turn fruitful fields into deserts, to level the cottage of the peasant, and the magnificent abode of opulence, to scourge nations with famine, to multiply widows and orphans. Are these honorable deeds? Were you called to name exploits worthy of demons, would you not naturally select such as these? Grant that a necessity for them may exist. It is a dreadful necessity such as a good man must recoil from with instinctive horror; and, though it may exempt them from guilt, it can not turn them into glory. HONOR IN WAR.-God grant that there We have thought that it was honorable to had never been war! But war we Ameri- heal, to save, to mitigate pain, to snatch the cans have lately had, and war (a war of re-sick and sinking from the jaws of death. bellion) is now being waged in China, and We have placed among the revered benefacthe Cretans are as fighting rebels, engaged tors of the human race the discoverer of arts which alleviate human sufferings, which prolong comfort, adorn and cheer human life; and if these arts be honorable, where is the glory of multiplying and aggravating tortures and death?" EARLY RISING.-A great deal of false philosophy has had its day on the subject of early rising. The true rule is for a person to get out of bed when he has had sleep enough. It is very proper to rise early, if you go to bed early. But it is essential to health that a person should have sleep enough. Many a child's health has been ruined by forcing him out of bed before he has had enough of "Tired nature's sweet restorer, balmy sleep." It is just as unnatural and injurious to deprive him of his food, as to deprive him of his sleep. Sleep is natural-not artificialand when a man or boy has had what his constitution requires of it, he will himself awaken, and get out of bed. I am very well aware that the wise man inveighs against the sluggard's lying in bed, and turning himself as the door turns upon its hinges: but if all reports concerning Solomon be true, he himself must have spent no small part of his time in bed. Whether he slept much, or not, is another question. THE UNIVERSALISTS AND THE REBELS. When I was arrested and taken over to Macon, after the surrender of the Confederate ar- This seemed to be a stunner, and the editor floundered through ever so much twattle to parry what it was evident he considered the most home-thrust ever made against Universalism. It was plain that he was almost convinced that if indeed there be no hell, there should be one, just to burn the rebels. And I have no doubt if his correspondent continued to ply him at his weak point, the editor became convinced of the realities of hell. Even if he has not yet become a convert, no doubt he will hereafter, if not here. "THE BLUE LAWS."-The editors of Appleton's New American Cyclopedia devote an article to the "Blue Laws." They say, "This term is sometimes applied to the early enactments of several of the New England States, but is more frequently limited to the laws of New Haven colony. The origin of the term is not exactly known. Various conjectures have been made, but the most probable derivation is that given by Professor Kingsley, who thinks the epithet "blue" was applied to any one who (in the times of Charles II.) looked with disapprobation on the licentiousness of the times. Thus, in Hudibras, "For his religion, it was fit To match his learning and his wit; 'Twas Presbyterian true blue." That this epithet should find its way to the It was here colonies, was a matter of course. applied not only to persons, but to the cus toms, institutions, and laws of the Puritans, by those who wished to render the prevailing system ridiculous. Hence, probably, a belief with some, that a distinct system of laws known as the blue laws, must somewhere have had a local habitation. The existence of such a code of blue laws is fully disproved. The only authority in its favor is Peters, who is notoriously untrustworthy. The traditions upon this subject, from which Peters framed his stories, undoubtedly arose from the fact that the early settlers of New Haven were uncommonly strict in their application of the "general rules of righteousness." Judge Smith, in his continuation of the history of New York, published in New York Historical Collections, vol. iv., gives evidence against the existence of the blue laws, which is particularly valuable, as it was put on record some 15 years before Peters's history was published. He writes: "Few there are who speak of the blue laws (a title of the origin of which the author is ignorant) who do not imagine they form a code of rules drawn up pædists against the existence of the laws, I now present what argument is before me that this code of blue laws did not only exist in the decisions of the Puritan courts, but were actually digested into regular statute law. I have before me a small volume entitled as follows: "The Code of 1650, being a Compilation of the earliest Laws and Orders of the General Court of Connecticut: also the Constitution or Civil Compact, entered into and adopted by the Towns of Windsor, Hartford, and Wethersfield, in 1638-9. To which is added some Extracts from the Laws and Judicial Proceedings of New Haven Colony, commonly called Blue Laws. Hartford: Published by Silas Andrus. 1822." In the preface to the work before me, the compiler says: "The following sheets contain an exact copy of the constitution, or form of civil government, as adopted by the towns of Windsor, Hartford, and Wethersfield, and the Code of 1650, as confirmed by the General Court of Connecticut. These were both taken from the original records remaining in the office of the Secretary for the State. . . . The ancient orthography has been accurately preserved." The following is the preamble to the "Constitution of 1683:" "Forasmuch as it hath pleased the Almighty God, by the wise disposition of his divine providence, so to order and dispose of things, that we the inhabitants and residents of Windsor, Hartford, and Weathersfeild are now cohabiting and dwelling in, and uppon the river of Conneticutt, and the lands thereThe Encyclopædists virtually admit that unto adjoining, and well knowing when a there were blue laws. They contend that people are gathered together, the word of there was no digested code of them, but they God requires, that to meinteine the peace and were "only records of convictions," etc. union of such a people, there should bee an These records, then, according to the rule orderly and decent governement established concerning all recorded decisions of courts, according to God, to order and dispose of the did actually form a code of laws. But the affaires of the people at all seasons, as occaEncyclopædists contend that the Puritans sions shall require; doe therefore associate themselves did not call these laws or decisions and conjoine ourselves to bee as one publique the blue laws: and this is no doubt true. The STATE, OR COMMONWEALTH; and doe, for term "blue" was probably applied to the ourselves and our successors, and such as code of Connecticut in derision. The Puri- shall be adjoined to us at any time hereafter, tans and their friends are anxious to make it enter into combination and confederation appear that no such a code as the "blue together, to meinteine and preserve the liblaws" ever had any existence: and this is berty and purity of the Gospell of our Lord not to be wondered at: for these laws are a Jesus, which we now profess, as also the disgrace to their cruel, puritanical concoctors. discipline of the churches, which, according Having given the argument of the cyclo-to the truth of the said Gospell, is now prac tised amongst us; as allso, in our civill affaires to be guided and governed according to such lawes, rules, orders, and decrees, as shall be made, ordered, and decreed, as followeth." I will now present the reader with some extracts from the "Code of 1650:" "If any man, after legall conviction, shall have or worship any other God but the Lord God, hee shall bee put to death. Deut. xiii. 6—xvii. 2; Ex. xxii. 20; Deut. xviii. 10, 11.” "If any man or woman bee a Witch, that is, hath, or consulteth with a familliar spirritt, they shall bee put to death. Ex. xxii. 18; Levit. xx. 27; Deut. xviii. 10, 11." "If any person shall blaspheme the name of God the ffather, Sonne, or Holy Ghost, with direct, express, presumptuous, or highhanded blasphemy, or shall curse in the like manner, hee shall bee put to death. Levit. xxiv. 15, 16." "If any person committeth adultery with a married or espoused wife, the Adulterer and the Adulteress shall surely bee put to death. Levit. xx. 10-xviii. 20; Deut. xxii. 23, 24." The Code contains a provision to the effect that "fforasmuch as it is observed that many abuses are crept into, and committed, by frequent taking of tobacko," therefore no person under the age of twenty-one years, "shall take any tobacko untill hee hath brought a certificate under the hands of some who are approved for knowledge and skill in phisick, that it is usefull for him, and allso that hee hath received a lycence from the courte for the same." It is further provided that no one shall use tobacco, even under the foregoing "lycence," “publiquely in the streett, highwayes, or any barne yardes, or uppon training dayes, in any open places, under the penalty of six pence for each offence." Here are some extracts from "New Haven Antiquities, or Blue Laws, extracted from the Ancient Records of New Haven:" "David Anderson was whipped for being drunke. "Goodman Leone was whipped and sent out of the plantation, being not onely a disorderly person himselfe, butt an incourager of others to disorderly drinking meetings." "A Courte holden the 1st of July, 1640.Thomas Parsons and John, servants to Elias Parkmore, were whipped for their sinfull dalliance and folly with Lydia Browne." "A Court held at New Haven the 3rd of the 7th month, 1642.-John Lobell, the miller, for sinful dalliance with a little wench of Goodman Hall's, was whipped." I presume my readers have had enough of the "blue laws" for the present. The origin of the term is probably that quoted from Prof. Kingsley, in the beginning of these paragraphs on the ancient code of Connecticut. In giving his definitions of the word blue, Webster says, "to look blue; to be confounded, or terrified," and quotes Grose as authority. The "blue laws" imply severity and terror. We speak of the blues as a contraction for the blue devils. We speak of rum as blue ruin, and of a severe discharge of lightning as a streak of blue lightning. I can't conceive why the term blue should be used in this connection, unless it is because brimstone burns with a bluish flame, and hell is represented as being full of burning brimstone. Hence, perhaps, the term blue devils. "LETTERS OF SHAHCOOLEN."-I have in my library a book entitled "Letters of Shahcoolen, a Hindu Philosopher residing in Philadelphia, to his Friend, El Hassan, an Inhabitant of Delhi. Boston: Printed by Russell and Cutler, (Proprietors of the Work), 1802." These letters are intended to be after the manner of Goldsmith's Citizen of the World, and were contributed originally to the New York Commercial Advertiser. The dedication runs as follows: "To the Hon. John Quincy Adams, Esquire, whose attainments as a scholar, and "A General Court, 5th February, 1639.—intelligence as a statesman and civilian, have Isaiah, Captaine Turner's man, fined 5 lbs. deservedly ranked him among the first politfor being drunk on the Lord's day. "Wm, Bromfield, Mr. Malbon's man, was sett in the stocks for prophaning the Lord's day, and stealing wine from his master, which he drunk and gave to others. "Ellice, Mr. Eaton's boy, was whipped for stealing a sow and a goate from his master, which he drunk, and gave to others. ical and literary characters of America, this volume, containing pure morals, correct politics, and elegant literature, is respectfully dedicated, as a testimony of the admiration and esteem of his obedient servants, the publishers." I do not know who the author of Shahcoolen's Letters is, and he seems to have |