he hesitated Own the mouth of the cave, he has no need * " but as having been the residence ana school-house of Pestalozzi. Noted as he has been all over Europe for his scholastic theory, he is said to have been a very bad practical schoolmaster, and this establishment, at the headquarters of his system, was a complete failure. Yverdun is situated at the foot of the Lake of Neufchatel, up which we took steamer in the morning to the town of that name. It is very prettily situated on the steep slope of the Jura mountains. We remained an hour there, which gave sufficient time for seeing the town, and then proceeded in the steamer up the lake, which connects with the Lake of Bienne by a river of some length, made navigable for the steamer. The scenery on both these lakes, though tame and comparatively insipid, is not without its interest, but should properly be taken at the commencement of a Swiss tour. We got to Bienne about four o'clock P.M. My intention was to proceed to Tavannes, under the possibility that my poor friend might be still lingering, and still more that Mrs. L. might have made an effort to undertake the journey from London, and that I might find her there. I learned, however, from the innkeeper that his remains had passed through * I regretted that we had not more time to ascertain the state of religion in Lausanne. But there, as in many other instances, it is striking to see from what very humble beginnings revivals of religion have taken place. My readers will not fail to be interested with the following particulars:-"About twenty-eight years ago, a pious lady, who happened to visit Lausanne, mourning over the state of things which she saw around her, determined to make some attempts to call the minds of the people to religious considerations. With this design in view, she began to circulate tracts of a nature to arrest the attention of the careless, and induce them to ponder their eternal interests. One of these was providentially brought into the hands of M. Scholl, at that time a student in the College at Lausanne, and proved the means of his conversion. With characteristic decision and devotedness, this excellent man no sooner experienced the great change himself, and awoke from that state of darkness and torpor in which he had been content before to rest, than he set himself to labour for the extension of the same blessing to others. His first efforts were directed to his fellow-students, and among them, through the divine blessing, these efforts proved very successful. Having thus gathered around him a band of congenial spirits, he unfurled the Gospel banner, and stood boldly forth to proclaim the long-neglected truths of Christianity to his countrymen. His efforts, and those of his coadjutors, were eminently successful. A season of extraordinary religious revival visited the entire Canton, and was followed by the most valuable fruits. Prayer meetings and preaching on week days were greatly multiplied. The College, which had been the scene of the movement, participated in the happy fruits. Soon all the professors, twelve or fourteen in number, could be counted among the friends of Evangelical religion; no doubt they have exerted an important influence upon the work ever since. Throughout the Canton, ten religious societies were formed to promote the cause of vital Christianity in various ways, and twenty small dissenting Evangelical churches were, ere long, organized and consolidated, in addition to the Evangelical ministers in the Established Church. The latter have usually been estimated at twothirds of the whole."" Bienne the day before, to be interred at Berne, and that his family had left Tavannes. We therefore kept our quarters at the Hotel du Jura, and tarried there over the Sabbath. The town, which contains about 4000 inhabitants, is very prettily situated, and the views of the snowy Alps from the heights above, are magnificent. There, too, on the limestone, I found a most prolific locality for plants. I gathered in flower Genista triquetra, a very bright pink Dianthus, about a foot high, our largest garden perennial Aster, Veronica Spicata, several Gentianas, and evident traces of an abundance of other rarities. Though the town is chiefly Protestant, it was melancholy to see the shops open on the Sunday, and I saw tailors and shoemakers at work. We had another sad proof of Sabbath desecration. It was one of the four Sundays in the Autumn when it is the custom to resort to an island on the lake, where all sorts of pastimes are carried forward throughout the day. Parties were constantly arriving at our hotel on their way, and taking tea or supper there on our return. The landford seemed to think it strange that Iwe did not fall in with the stream.* The next morning we engaged a voiture for Basle for forty francs, the distance between fifty and sixty miles. We started early in order to be able to accomplish it in a day. And certainly no one should go through that lovely scenery in any other than an entirely open carriage. We had a long ascent in rising from Bienne, from which the distant views of the Alps over the Lake, are supremely ⚫grand. We then descended rapidly into a narrow defile, with high, precipitous, wooded sides, and a romantic river. Nothing can exceed its loveliness, though what we saw afterward is of a bolder and more magnificent character. We breakfasted at Sonceboz, and after a long ascent came to Pierre Pertius, a rocky arch, under *In justice to the master of the Hotel du Jura, I must give our counter-statement to that of Murray. From what it may have" fallen," of course I cannot say; but we found everything most comfortable, the master most civil and attentive, and the charges reasonable. MAY-1847. which we passed. It is a natural opening, enlarged by art, and was known to the Romans, as is proved by a defaced inscription on the north side. It is about forty feet high, and ten or twelve thick. We soon after came to Tavannes, and passed the hotel in its melancholy dilapidated condition. Oh, what were we that we should have been carried forward from place to place amidst so much providential mercy and enjoyment! Surely there is but one power that can protect and keep us in our going out and coming in. It does not neutralize the enjoyment of a pleasurable tour to be so awfully reminded, as we had been, of our entire dependance on that power-it only counteracts and subdues all those unhallowed feelings which are so apt to get into exercise, and really enhances the sweetness of all the privileged blessings which are vouchsafed to us. The country was still beautiful, though without any peculiar interest_till we came to the Moutiers Grandval, or Münster valley. It consists of a series of rocky narrow defiles, alternating with open basins, covered with black pine forests above, and verdant meadows below, enlivened by villages, mills, and forges. In some parts the gorge is so narrow that there is only just room for the road and the river, as is the case in the Hollenthal valley, and near Cluses, on the way to Chamouny. Nothing that we had seen in the whole of our tour could prevent our being most exceedingly delighted with the grand and varied scenery of the Münster valley. It began to rain as we had got through the best of it, and poured all the way to Basle, where we arrived about ten o'clock, at the The Three Kings-a palace of an inn. It occurred to me to make some inquiries about my Tavannes friends, who, I found, were well known there. Mrs. L. had got as far as Basle on her way to Tavannes, but receiving the sad tidings there, had returned to London two or three days before. It was provoking to find that her daughter, Mrs. K., was in the hotel that very night, on her way from Tavannes, but having gone to bed early, and left very early the next morning, I did not see her. As the train did not leave for Strasburg till two o'clock in the afternoon, we had abundance of time for surveying the town. I regretted however extremely that I did not get a sight of the Missionary Institution to which we in England have been so largely indebted for our Missionaries. We completed our stock of prints at a very good shop; and thought of Erasmus while walking through the cloisters, which are very extensive and picturesque. They were constructed in the 14th century, and extend to the verge of the hill overlooking the river. And near the Minster is the house in which Ecolampadius lived and died. The story of his death-bed scene is worth recording : Do you "As night gathered, and the rumour spread that the Reformer would not live till the morning, the ministers of Basle, to the number of ten, hastened to his presence. Already on a former occasion he had given them his dying charge, beseeching them to be men of light and men of love; now he said but little, as he desired to remain calm and still. bring any tidings?' exclaimed he to a person of rank who entered the room; the answer was in the negative. A feeling of self-reproach seemed to cross his mind for asking such a question at such a moment, and he said hastily, 'But I-I shall soon be with my Lord.' By and bye, one asked him whether the light of the lamp did not annoy him; laying his hand on his heart, he exclaimed, Here, here is where I have enough of light.' At length the day began to dawn; in a feeble voice he chaunted the 51st Psalm; and then heaving a sigh he said, 'Lord Jesus, come to my help.' He spoke no more; but quietly breathed his last. The sun now poured his rays into the chamber, but they fell on that inanimate corpse, and on the pale and weeping friends who, with uplifted hands, were kneeling around his couch. 6 "Does it not seem striking that one who, answerable to his name,* had been such a bright and shining *Haus-schein-House-light, which after the fashion of his day, was grecised into Ecolampadius. light' in the world, should, in the last words he addressed to his fellow-men, have spoken so firmly and joyously of that light which was within hima light in which thousands had rejoiced to walk, and which calumny has not been able to darken, nor death itself to extinguish! Striking too, that one whose life had been a long and earnest protest against darkness, should thus wait for the morning light ere he passed away to be for ever with Him who dwelleth in light, and in whom there is no darkness at all." The town is beautifully situated on the Rhine, which washes against the wall of the Three Kings. Though every thing is on such a magnificent scale at this hotel, we did not find the charges higher than elsewhere. There is nothing worthy of notice in the country between Basle and Strasburg (distance about ninety miles), where we were glad to find ourselves comfortably seated in the Ville de Paris about nine o'clock. It was difficult to persuade ourselves that we were in France, everything has such an entirely German aspect. The next morning we sallied forth to the cathedral, as the great lion of Strasburg, taking in our way a shop which is noted for the manufacture of various articles from lead spun into thread. We bought, for a small sum, some bracelets and broaches, which are exceedingly chaste and pretty in their effect. Having previously heard it stated that the Cathedral is one of the noblest gothic edifices in Europe, I own I was disappointed. The unfinished state of most of the continental cathedrals is a great drawback. to the general effect. The east end is paltry in the extreme. If only pro tempore, it should be less meagre. The spire is remarkable as being the highest in the world; it rises 474 feet above the pavement, 24 feet higher than the great pyramid of Egypt, and 140 feet higher than St. Paul's. The nave of the church was begun in 1015, and finished in 1275. It was high mass, and the organ and singing were beautiful. Every one has heard of the famous clock. It stands inside the cathedral, in the south transept. The mechan ism, no doubt, is very ingenious, but it is a pity that it does not operate for a more rational purpose. I can only compare the clock to a ridiculously huge child's toy. The full mechanism is only set in motion at noon, when, amongst other ridiculous movements, the twelve Apostles march forth, each making his obeisance to the Saviour as he passes. The transept was crammed full of spectators at twelve o'clock, just as if it had been the first day of exhibiting. The crowd was so great that we could scarcely get a good view, though in ample time. (To be continued.) THE RELIGIOUS USES OF HISTORY. It is worthy of notice that the Bible commences almost immediately with the history of man. A rapid sketch of the process of creation, adapted to popular comprehension, having been given, the first man is immediately placed before us. Heathen writers give long genealogies of gods and angels; the mind is bewildered amid the labyrinths of the Hindoo Pantheon, the cosmogony of the Zendavesta, and the theogony of Hesiod. But in the Biblical account of the creation there is nothing of the kind. We have, even, no preliminary narrative of the fall of some of the angels, though there are intimations of that event in subsequent parts of the Scriptures, and the traditions of many nations point to it, nor do we find any distinct account of the state of things which may have previously existed on our earth; but having declared God to be the Creator of everything above, beneath, and around, the Mosaic account carries us at once to-man. We are told of Adam's innocence, temptation, and fall: his subsequent restoration is prophesied: we may infer his repentance and faith; and then, in the murder of Abel by Cain, we see first brought into development the two classes of mankind, the righteous and the wicked, those who lamenting man's primal apostacy struggle in God's appointed way to return to him again, and those who, adopting a course of conduct in accordance with the first transgression, persist in a fatal contumacy. And the sacred records go on further to unfold the history of man, combining narrative with doctrine. We are thus taught by Revelation itself to turn our eyes on the progress of the world's history, to trace the course of God's providential arrangements, and to observe that " righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.' 1. The philosopher delights when contemplating some great nation at the summit of its power, to trace it back to those infant beginnings whence it first stole forth into visible existence; as the traveller who has long followed the course of some mighty river, stands at last admiringly by the little spring whence its waters flow. Let us compare the rude villages of the primitive Greeks with the consummate elegance of Athens in the days of her glory; or the small city of Romulus with that Roman empire, which covered a territory of more than two thousand miles in breadth, and more than three thousand miles in length of the finest portion of the globe-or those ancient British warriors whose remains are occasionally found accompanied with the solitary spear-head, the chain, or the amulet, with the present inhabitants of this island, on whose dominions the sun never sets; and though we may be able to find abundant second causes for the change, let us not hesitate to acknowledge as the first reason, the will of Him who "putteth down one and setteth up another." If we examine an engine of modern manufacture, it is not sufficient to ascribe the cause of its useful operations to the wheels, the pullies, or the steam; we go at once to the reason which arranged it, and ascribe the whole adaptation to the 10 skill of the artificers. So, however great may be the influence of climate or hereditary organization upon different classes of the human race, they still have all had an allotted part to perform; they have been gathered to gether to do whatsoever God's hand and counsel had f determined before to be doner" and often have the most unlikely instruments, and the merest chances produced great events, shewing the more strikingly that some superior hand was regulating the whole ffTis strange and surprise ing, says Ockley," to consider from how mean and contemptible be ginnings the greatest things have, by the providence of God, been raised in a short time, of which the Saracenical empire is a very considerable instance for if we look back about eleven years, we shall find how Mahomet, unable to support his cause, routed and oppressed by the powerful party of the Korashites at Mecca, attended by a very small number of his despairingsfollowers, fled to Me dina, no less for the preservation of his life, than his imposture; and now withing so short a time after, we find the undertakings of his successor prosper so much beyond expectation, as to become a terror to all his neigh bours and the Saracens in a capacity, not only of keeping in their own hands their peninsula of Arabia, but of extending their arms over larger territories than ever were subject to the Romans themselves. There could no time have happened more fatal to the Empire, nor more favourable to the enterprises of the Saracens, who seemotos have been raised-upon purpose by God to be la scourge to the Christian church, for not living answerably to that most holy religion which they had received."Are not facts such as this recorded "to the intent that the living may know that the Most High ruleth over the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whom soever he will, and setteth up over it the basest of men??? to oblid, modt We have, also, fa remarkable instance of providential interference in the history of the Reformation in England. "The greatest affairs," *History of the Saracens, Vol. i. p. 17.* I observes Hume, "often depend on the most frivolous incidents. The courier who carried the king's written promise" [to submit his cause to the Pope] "was detained beyond the day appointed; news was brought to Rome that a libel had been published in England against the court of Rome, and a farce acted before the king in derision of the pope and cardinals. The pope and cardinals entered into the consistory inflamed with anger; and by a precipitate sentence the marriage of Henry and Catherine was pronounced valid, and Henry declared to be excommunieated if he refused to adhere to it. Two days after, the scourier arrived; and Clement, who had been hurried from his usual prudence, found, that though he heartily repented of this hasty measure, it would be difficult for him to retract it, or replace affairs on the same footing as before. How true is it that if He leadeth the cotinsellors away spoiled!" saldase 9d2.The successive appearance and disappearance of mighty empires on the stage of the world, present striking phenomena to the student of hise torys The growing empire becomes gradually developed, like some huge phantom stealing out of surrounding darknesss it is clothed in the swelling robes of an almost universal dominion but, at length, an internal disease corrodes its vitals, and a shock fromtalscomparatively feebley hand throws the giant tos the earthɔnA band of hardy warriors suddenly start up, as if by enchantment, and, gifted with almost superhuman prowess advance amid their more civilized neighbours, carrying with them destruction and regeneration; and having performed their appointed office, they, too, yield in turn to new invaders. Sou did the Israelites drive before them the licentious Canaanites: tso did the robber-band of Romulus grow into an empire, whose extent almost justified the vanity which denominated it all the world'uso did the Parthian Arsaces and his few adherents found a dominion which at length extended from the Euphrates to the Indus, and defied the Roman arms in the pride of their strength: so did the Goths over-run Europe: so did : I |