has a sweetheart, with whom she likes to ramble in the fields, or to a public-house, on Sunday evenings; and, nine times out of ten, the Sunday evening sweetheart is a burglar, who thus makes himself acquainted with the house and its fastenings. The schools are at fault. Children of the poor are taught too many hymns, and not enough about the duties of their station. And what does the education of

girls in the middle classes consist of? Showy accomplishments, which have been thus amusingly satirised in the description of a young lady at an evening party. On being led to the piano, she first throws a timid glance round the room, ostensibly to evince a gentle confusion; in reality, to see who is looking at her. She then observes to the mistress of the house, 'that she is not in very good voice, having a slight cold,' which she confirms by a faint sound, something between a sigh, a smile, and a single-knock cough. The hostess replies, 'Oh, but you always sing so delightfully.' The young lady answers that she is certain she cannot this evening;' to strengthen which opinion, she makes some young gentleman exceedingly joyous by giving him her bouquet to hold; and, drawing off her gloves in the most approved style, tucks them behind one of the candlesticks, together with her flimsy handerchief, in such a fashion that its deep-laced border or embroidered name may be seen to the best advantage. The top of the piano, which had been opened for the quadrilles, is then shut down by an active gentleman, who pinches his fingers in the attempt; the musicians form a series of dissolving views, and disappear, no one kuows where, nor ever will; and the young lady takes her place at the piano, and, as she plays the chords of the key she is about to luxuriate in, everybody is not perfectly silent; so she finds the music stool is too high, or too low, or something of the kind, and the pedals appear exceedingly difficult to be found. At length everybody being still, she plays the symphony again, and then-smiling at the hostess and saying ‘that she is certain she shall break down'-brings out the opening note of the recitative, which makes the drops of the chandelier vibrate again, and silences a couple who are whispering all sorts of soft nothings on a causeuse in the back drawing-room.' Such are the affectations which pervade female society. And it is needless to say, that no good can come of them. If marrying men were to require something more than this from their 'sweethearts,' and married men were to teach their wives the beauty of usefulness, there would be more real happiness experienced by wives as well as husbands;

and crinoline might be regarded as a trifling folly-rather amusing than otherwise, and not altogether ungraceful.

"The work of reform, however, should begin in the schools. Paterfamilias has a duty perform, which is scandalously neglected by him. He is too fond of seeing his darling showing off her 'accomplishments;' exhibiting the drawings which her teacher has finished for her, and displaying her musical and vocal proficiency in banging the piano or screaming through the scales. Let Paterfamilias study to be a wiser man: look for schools for his daughters where the useful arts are taught as well as the showy ones, and where girls may learn that the best way to get good husbands is by combining duties with accomplishments, a knowledge of housekeeping and the requirements of the sick chamber, as well as crotchet and the pianoforte."

What sort of an evil is a sectarian spirit? asks Rowland Hill? It is the cruel wedge of Satan's own forging to separate Christians from each other. Surely a reformation of that which is wrong, may be effected without a demolition of that which is right. The doctrine which, from the first origin of religious dissensions, has been held by all bigots, may be condensed into a few words, and, stripped of rhetorical disguise, is simply this :-“I am in the right, and you are in the wrong. When you are the stronger, you ought to tolerate me; for it is our duty to tolerate truth: but when I am the stronger, I shall persecute you, for it is my duty to persecute error." Persecution heals no schisms, any more than intolerance does sectarianism. Of some of these advocates truly we have reason to exclaim-Save us from our friends! Thank GOD, we need not depend for guidance upon what another does. The world may follow like sheep the wake of their leader, and be content to lose their own specific individualism. We plead nobody's mission-we state nobody's

cause.

When great duties come upon a man, nothing can stand in the way of their discharge. A man must forsake brethren, father, and mother, when he is called to do great duties. If a man wishes to have elbow room, he must shun cliques and parties. "An intolerant sect is a sect in fear."

We should have no difficulty in solving the great problem of education now discussed (to many, doubtless, usque ad nauseam), if the right hand of fellowship was held out to true Christians in every section of the Church. While political factions are engrafted on theological sects, there can be no good issue. The Vicar of Bray, in Berkshire, was a Papist under Henry VIII., and a Protestant under Edward VI.; he was a Papist again under Mary; and once more became a Protestant in the reign of Elizabeth. When this scandal to the gown was reproached for his versatility of religious creed, and taxed for being a turncoat, and an inconsistent changling (as Fuller expresses it), he replied "Not so, neither; for if I changed my religion, I am sure I kept true to my principle, which is, to live and die Vicar of Bray!" Doubtless the late consummate statesman and tactician, Talleyrand, might have expressed himself in a similar manner-"The favourite statesman will be the favourite statesman still." He shamelessly avowed-" Words were given us to hide our thoughts." Dr. Kitchen, bishop of Llandaff, from an idle abbot under Henry VIII., was made a busy Protestant bishop under Edward; he returned to his old master under Mary; and at last took the oath of supremacy under Elizabeth, and finished as a Parliament Protestant. A pun

spread the odium of his name, for they said he had always loved the Kitchen better than the Church! We may suppose our more recent wily French politician Talleyrand, imagined these were no bad precedents, if we may judge from his sinuous windings and shiftings.

Guizot thought differently in reference to these matters: this model of precision and clearness counselled prefects, mayors, and committees of examination. The finest of these productions is the circular to the teachers of the parishes. In its few pages there is as much true eloquence, as much of poetry, style, and thought, as in the most admirable works of the epoch. With what touching familiarity does the minister stretch forth his hand to the poor; observes the village preceptor; how he elevates him in the eyes of all, and especially in his own; how he fills him with the importance of his mission. He is almost his friend, his colleague, his equal. For both are trying, each in his sphere, to secure the repose and glory of the country. And then, with what paternal solicitude does the statesman, from the recesses of his cabinet, enter into the most significant details of the relations of the teacher with the children, parents, &c. "No sectarian or party spirit," he exclaims, "in your school; the teacher must rise above the fleeting quarrels which agitate society. Faith in Providence, the sanctity of duty, submission to parental authority, respect for the laws, the princes, the rights of all,-such are the sentiments he must seek to develope; and at last he must expect his recompense only from God." In Guizot we have the fiery zeal of Luther, the unctuous mildness of

Melancthon, the dove-like spirit of Fenelon, and the inflexible severity of Richelieu: he is worthy, by the lofty virtue of his life and sentiments, of the esteem of all good men. No one sleeps while he speaks.

The

Goethe is essentially an elevated and progressive intellectualist, in posession of one of the main elements in Christian religion, viz., love and reverence to man. only true religion is that which makes us reverence our fellow-creatures; which leads us to seek for, and believe in no happiness for ourselves alone, while our companions are suffering. We repeat-it is not the following of a shadowy, frigid, and ceremonial idea, or allowing one's heart to be steeled against our fellows by a set of idle formulas, as monkish as they are stale, flat, and unprofitable. Any one who has studied the nature of life, and of the various organs and faculties which the human frame possesses, knows that one of the laws which must never be lost sight of in inquiries into the vital phenomena, is this that every organ and faculty in the body works invariably in all cases, and at all times, for the good of the whole. This law applies exactly in the same way to all intellectual and moral operations: every thought and feeling of the mind must by the necessity of our being, tend to the preservation, not the destruction of organism, and therefore must be in like manner essentially good.

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But what say the tight-laced ones? All within their insulated sphere, their pale, was the centre of salvation; and outside this sphere revolved desolation and ruin, and before whom all semi-papistical latitudinarians must hide their diminished rays. No class of persons so strangely