once permitted, the step was short from admiration or respect to adoration and prayer to them, and whatever or whoever is invariably represented as the greatest or most powerful, will become the chief object of devotion. On all occasions wherever the image of Mary is erected, she is upon the larger scale, Christ upon the lesser-in all puppets, or dolls, or statues, or pictures great or small in size as may be, the Virgin is made as an adult, Jesus as a child; she is arrived at the age of authority, he is a dependant babe-the figures, whether painted or sculptured, exhibit Christ in a state of weakness, wanting the care and instruction of his mother. In this form he is continually brought before the eyes, and presented to the minds of Romanists, who thus necessarily associate the idea of Christ with that of a helpless infant; and the mother, not the Son, becomes the object of worship, as the one who always seeming the most powerful, is the person to whom prayer or adoration is most justly due. When Papists are trained from their earliest youth to see these representations which are called "the Virgin and child," for she is always named first, not he, it is impossible to prevent the mind believing the parent should be the person addressed, and that she also ought to have the respect of her Son, as well as the adoration of all others. This perpetual exhibition of strength and weakness in the persons of Mary and Jesus is, we believe, the real cause why the worship of the Virgin is more general in Popish countries than that of Christ.

Mary is undoubtedly the universal object of prayer in the Romish Church; the Rosary has but one paternoster for every ten ave-Mary's; and this species of idolatry has probably obtained such general obser

vance, from the oft-repeated manifestations of the relative proportions of strength, authority, and power in the one, contrasted with the dependance, subjection, and helplessness of the other.

The New Testament writers touch slightly upon the birth, infancy, and youth of Jesus. Those times are past over with scarcely a notice of more than was absolutely necessary to explain his history, nor do the Evangelists dwell upon his character, doctrines, or words until he was at the age of thirty, whereas the Church of Rome devotes her attention chiefly to his earliest childhood, and most of the pictures and statues pourtray him as in the arms of his mother. Yet that was a period in his life upon which the Gospels and Epistles never dilate.

Popery is essentially false and unscriptural in regard to the worship of the Virgin-there is not one word in Scripture which gives the least intimation that she ever was to become an Intercessor or Mediator either when the Lord was on earth, or now that he is in heaven. It is remarkable, and deserving of serious attention, that although Christ treated all women with the utmost compassion, courtesy, and kindness, he seemed to single out Mary, his mother, as the only one of her sex to whom was shown any mark of disrespect or neglect ; in his youth he was obedient to both herself and Joseph, but after the commencement of his public ministry there is no reason to suppose he had either residence or communication with them. On occasion of Christ's first miracle at the marriage in Cana of Galilee, where Mary also was, when she merely spoke to him, he most unexpectedly and abruptly said to her, "Woman, what have I to do with thee?" At another time, when he was told his mother and sisters

"stood without, desiring to speak to him?" he does not appear to have noticed them in any way, but at once declared that all who did his will were "his mother, and sister, and brother." A more singular circumstance than even those instances of disclaiming any human relationship, took place at the most solemn moment of his life-when Mary was standing at the foot of the Cross. Jesus said unto John, “Behold thy mother;" there was the wish that she should be remembered and cared for by his disciple, whilst at the same time he disowned every earthly tie of kindred, and did not even then acknowledge her as his mother-when this is evidently one meaning of his request or command, how can it be supposed that she who during his whole public life had been treated with less tenderness than many other women, whether Jews or Gentiles, that she, whose very relationship had been transferred from himself to another, was to be the chief mediator, and intercessor, and Queen of Heaven? and all this, without any appointment by the Lord, or any revelation from God, was to be made a leading doctrine of Christianity! They "do err, not knowing the Scriptures," who teach such falsehood, for he who believes in Mary as a mediator, cannot also believe that there is but one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; (1 Tim. ii. 5.) and the Church which sets aside the peculiar office of the Saviour, " denies the Lord who bought them.'

Again; the Church of Rome has not only made it one of her chief objects to exhibit Christ as an helpless infant, she has likewise seized upon another and very different scene,

but also one of weakness; the favourite crucifix, which is quite as general amongst Papists as the Madonna, is a representation of Christ on the cross, as dying or dead; either or both of these pictures or images tend to the same end, that of perpetually showing the Lord in a state of dependance or exhaustion; and from these scenes constantly impressed upon the senses, the Romanist has Jesus perpetually brought before him as in a condition of helplessness or humiliation, whereas Mary is always depicted in the bloom of youth, health, and beauty.

Whether the inventors and abettors of the worship of Mary had the sinister design in view of debasing Christian worship to the level of heathenism we know not, but such is the result of Mariolatry, and the Spaniards and other Popish people who kneel at her shrines, know little beyond her names and attributes; and whilst whole Litanies are said or sung in her honour, or for her intercession, there is little time or inclination left for the service of the Lord God Almighty.

If, then, the main features of Romanist doctrines give false impressions of Christ's power and mediation, and have also created an idolatrous religion, it can excite no surprise to find that such a corrupt Church should present a wafer made of flour and water to be taken as "the body, soul, and divinity of Christ." Those who can believe the Virgin Mary has all power in heaven and earth, are in a state of ignorance which is ready to receive any other fiction, and they who bow down to wooden images, can be made to believe any other device of Satan.

S. P.

"THE poetry of earth is never dead." -The voice of the grasshopper in the hedge-row, of the cricket on the hearth, suggested the thought, and the pale snow-drops of spring, the flushed roses of summer, the golden

ears and gorgeous blossoms of autumn, the many-coloured leaves that flicker earthward at the first breath of winter, the glistering sprays and holly beads of Christmas, bear witness to the truth day by day, in

language more varied and expressive than ever flowed from a human pen, or was framed by a human tongue. Yet with the fair book of creation unfolded and unfolding before us, there are those who would persuade men that poetry, alike the lofty and the feeble, must needs be crushed and perish beneath the broad and rapidly advancing chariot wheel of civilization. They speak of the majestic strains of elder days, as of the nursery songs of nations, as of milk, with which it was fitting babes and sucklings should be nurtured, but as food insipid and contemptible in the estimation of full-grown men. There are others to whom whatever is poetical, either in language or sentiment, is about as interesting and intelligible as the Greek of Homer, or the Hebrew of David would prove to a cottage child. These appear to have awakened on the broad green earth, absolutely wanting the sensibility which should enable them to perceive among the scattered and crumbling ruins of the Fall, that the handiwork of God is yet " very good," and to be sought out of all them that have pleasure therein.

There are some, however, not so eagerly utilitarian, not so coldly

rational, not so hopelessly insensible as to turn a deaf ear to the voice of the charmer, and to shut out the wandering and haunting music of the minstrel from whatsoever quarter it may come. It would be strange, indeed, if there were not the harping of the harper, and the ear of the listener amongst us yet, for the same fair world (clouded by sin,) lies before us, as in the day when the morning stars sang together; the same feelings of triumphant gratitude awaken in the heart as in the morning when the timbrel of Miriam sounded over "Egypt's dark sea," the same melancholic bitterness is abroad in the earth, as in the hour when the spirit of darkness was chased from the royal threshold of Saul by the voice of the sweet singer of Israel. Wide are the fields of thought and observation spreading league beyond league before the dreaming eyes of the poet in our day. True it is, men strong of eye and bold of heart, have, as it were, scaled the walls of heaven, and walked among the stars, have untwined the golden braid of the noonday sunbeam, have watched the dews of evening, and found they are of earth rather than of heaven, and it has been forcibly said—

But not for this must the voice of poetry cease from among us, rather may we believe that there is enough in recent discoveries, and in their marvellous and manifold applications, to awaken the loftiest strains-strains differing from the songs of the heathen bards of old, but yet more thrilling, yet more spirit-stirring.

But it is not of secular poetry we would now speak, and we seem to have wandered a little from our subject, yet we have not altogether lost our path, for if "Christian Poetry" is to be something better than a mere

fettering of trite sentiments with rhyme and metre, religious poets must travel over wider ground than many persons might judge needful, or perhaps expedient, if the "psalms and hymns and spiritual songs" wherewith we edify one another are to win respect (and there is no reason why they should excite contempt,) from the world without. Writers of these compositions must not heed the labour, but must cultivate with care the gift that is within them; must search far and wide through the dim regions of antiquity, and the broad

realms laid open by modern science, for apposite and novel illustrations. The ships of Tarshish and the isles brought materials for the temple of the living God in Jerusalem, and in many a distant region, in many a hidden and unfrequented mine, may Christian writers find gifts to lay upon the altar of God in our day. If these gifts are brought in faith and humility, we know that one who cannot err has said "the altar sanctifieth the gift." Many excellently disposed individuals, had they been at hand when Saul of Tarsus was studying the Greek poets, would, we may believe, have passed heavy condemnation on the student, yet though the Apostle Paul afterwards declared of himself, that in general he came not with excellency of speech, or with man's wisdom, the same apostle scrupled not to avail himself of his human learning in the streets of Athens; and, it may be, his quotation from a Greek poet first inclined the heart of the Areopagite to listen to the novel doctrines of the Jewish stranger. It was once said, "Though religion may not require the aid of human learning, it still less requires the aid of human ignorance," and certainly there is no imaginable reason why our religious sentiments should always be presented to the world clad in sackcloth, if we can with a clear conscience wrap them in purple and fine linen. There is no great novelty in these observations it is confessed, but in times like our own, both the writers and readers of "Christian Poetry" may do well to call such obvious truths to mind. There are estimable persons of the latter class, who appear scarcely satisfied unless a whole circle of Scripture doctrines has been included in the hymn (it matters not on what particular subject,) which is to find acceptance in their sight, unless the form of words adopted be precisely that in which they have been accustomed to clothe their own devotional sentiments. Now it happens that a disagreeable monotony results from the continual employment of one particular style of phraseology in use on the most ordinary occasions, and poetry, as such, is apt to make to

itself wings and fly away, leaving be hind a religious sentiment probably correct and orthodox, and had it been expressed in simple prose, impressive and devotional, but cramped and fettered by the rules of versification, little calculated to excite another feeling than the languid wish that it had come before us under a more agreeable guise. It is well sometimes to read for others as well as ourselves, and to remember that the style of composition most consonant with our own peculiar taste, or state of feeling, may not be that best adapted to influence the world at large. We have said that there are ears and hearts prepared to yield themselves to the influence of poetry still amongst us, and what class of poetry is calculated to gain a wider audience than that of Christianity, if the hand of a master were on the harp-strings? The events of Christianity, from that unforgotten midnight when the angels of God were singing above the sheepfolds of Bethlehem, down to our own days of strife and armed watchfulness, furnish subject matter for the religious poet such as the bards of old found not in their most favoured hours of vision. Religious poetry also (using the term in its general sense,) would seem the prevailing taste of the day, where poetry is acceptable, and writers of the Tractarian school have ministered abundantly to the taste. They have devoted sedulous attention to this branch of literature, and they have found their reward, if we are to judge from the wide and rapid circulation of their labours in this direction.

Doubtless there is much in the belief, education, and sympathies of these writers which has contributed to render their poetry elegant and seductive; but we see not that to these alone is it permitted to enter the land of vision, we see not that soberminded Protestants must of necessity content themselves with homely prose, and yet more homely verse. There are many amongst us perfectly sound and orthodox in sentiment, who may yet have leisure, education, and poetic feeling, and, before such, a wide field of labour lies open, for on the fields of intellect and imagination the curse of the Fall is yet resting, and thorns