may be easily conveyed to the young mind regarding some great truth or doctrine; and that evil, once rooted, may prove difficult to remove. In treating difficult portions of Scripture, it will be wise to bestow considerable thought on the lesson prepared for the taught; and let us remember, in connection with this, that it will be utterly impossible here as elsewhere to be consistent without Divine assistance and blessing on our labour.

Finally, in regard to consistency, we would offer a few solemn remarks. We have expressed it as our opinion that the absence of this necessary principle in the Sunday teachers of the day arises partly from carelessness, or from not perceiving its necessity. We would also remark that another cause, probably more effective in producing the undesirable inconsistency so prevalent, is the want of thought regarding the immense responsibility, the awful (for they are such) obligations that rest on the religious teacher and trainer of the young. This is not so much considered as it should be. We are aware that in some schools, in the metropolis and elsewhere, a profound spirit of solemnity and awe obtains, and all seem fully conscious of the critical position they hold in regard to their charge. But with others we could name it is not so. A levity, thoughtlessness, and indifference, painful to behold, prevail amongst the teachers, who are many of them quite unfit for the high office they hold. Sufficient investigation and observation are not exercised by superintendents, who many of them take little precaution to assure themselves of the fact that the person

about to teach is fitted so to do, and does not require himself to be taught, and that he possesses sound Christian principles. Inconsistency in manner, dress, conversation, out of school, is but too observable in many Sunday teachers, and in others a very palpable absence of that solemn sense of responsibility to which we have alluded, and which is really a serious consideration. With regard to consistency in the week, it may be objected by some that Sunday-school children have little opportunity for seeing their teachers during the week days. Let us assure such that children generally have more opportunities for thus observing a teacher's life than is usually supposed. Therefore, let us as superintendents, as pastors, sift the chaff from the wheat. Let us carefully satisfy ourselves that the teachers we place over our youthful charge are at least sterling Christians in character, thus suited to set forth biblical truth to those under them. Let us lastly entreat the readers of the Treasury to observe a strict consistency in all things, as teachers of the rising generation. Let us endeavour to form the youthful character as God would have it, so that at the last great day of His appearing we be not condemned by seeing those which He had placed under our care on the left hand of His throne. The Almighty give both you and me, reader, a due sense of the importance of consistency in the tenour of our lives, as they affect those of our children. We all need His grace to strengthen and uphold us in the laborious work of teaching the young regarding the great and stern realities of time and eternity.

E. C.

NOTE-BOOK.

"I

lifted. "What! are there none here who are in the habit of praying?" say my prayers sometimes," responded a lad about fifteen years of age, who was seated close to the superintendent's desk. "You say your prayers, do you? Well, is there any difference between saying your prayers and what is

"Oh yes, sir,"

termed true prayer? replied the boy. A few remarks concerning this difference, and the necessity of our hearts being fully and earnestly engaged when worshipping the Lord, followed; and shortly afterwards the school was dismissed. But the words which had just been uttered on the subject of true prayer sank deep into the heart of the lad who had, in part, been the occasion of them; and they reminded him of those which time after time had fallen from the lips of his own teacher, a brother of the gentleman who had but recently questioned him. One Friday evening, not long after this, the boy's teacher went as usual to his weekly class-meeting-a social gathering held in connection with the Church of which he was a member, for the purpose of spiritual conversation and prayer. On ascending the steps leading up to the entrance, he found Harry-such was the name of the lad-with two others, awaiting him.

"Well, Harry, what are you here for? Is it anything in connection with what we have been discussing in our Sunday class? If so, I think I may ask you whether you mean to give your heart to God?" "I should like to, sir." "Then come along in with me; we shall all be glad to see you."

Class duties ended, a prayer-meeting followed. Harry remained among the seekers, to plead for mercy, and joined heartily in the fervent supplications which ascended that night in behalf of those whom the Spirit of God had awakened to a keen sense of their guilt and danger. One more happy Sabbath only after that eventful evening were teacher and scholar privileged to spend together; and when about to be dismissed for the last time from his

Sunday-school duties, Harry said, Please, sir, may we have a prayermeeting before we go? They told me to ask." "A prayer-meeting, my boy?

what is that for? Who is it wants to have one?" "Why, sir, I'm going to sea to-morrow, and some of them want to stay behind a little, and offer up prayer on my account."

Of course, such a request was readily complied with, and soon a group of schoolfellows gathered in the little vestry that they might commend the lad to the lovingkindness and tender mercy of Him who "ruleth the raging of the sea, and by His strength stilleth the waves thereof."

The next morning, a schooner sailed from an English harbour, to buffet with wind and waves; in it Harry was borne from his home, to be tested by a rough seafaring life. Will he "stand the storm? A few lines, extracted from a letter received by his teacher very recently, will perhaps be the best answer to this question:

"You wish to know about my troubles, and how I get on with the sailors, and so forth. I am thankful, in that respect, I have no reason to complain, as no one is unkind to me. I know I cannot expect all sunshine, as I often find things to be as I don't wish; but I hope, by God's help, to bear with them. I find that little book you lent me to be interesting and profitable to me. There

is also a Pilgrim's Progress' aboard, belonging to one of the men, which I often have, to read. I see many things in it, which I think very suitable to myself. Please, sir, when you write to your brother, ask him if he can remember the boy that told him in the Sundayschool that he said his prayers sometimes. Tell him that he can pray

IT IS FINISHED. BEHOLD, this storm, wherewith all the powers of the world were shaken, is now over. The elders, Pharisees, Judas, the soldiers, priests, witnesses, judges, thieves, executioners, devils, have all tired themselves in vain with their own malice; and Jesus triumphs over them all, upon the throne of His cross: His enemies are vanquished, His Father satisfied, His soul with this world at rest and glory: "It is finished." Now there is no more betraying, agonies, arraignments, scourgings, scoffing, crucifying, conflicts, terrors: all "is finished."

to

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Alas! beloved, and will not we let the Son of God be at rest? Do we now again go about to fetch Him out of His glory, to scorn and crucify Him? I fear say it. God's Spirit dare and doth; They crucify again to themselves the Son of God, and make a mock of Him :" themselves, not in Himself; that they cannot, it is no thank to them; they would do it. See and consider: the sinful conversations and pleasures of those that should be Christians offer violence unto our glorified Saviour; they stretch their hand to heaven, and pull Him down from His throne to His cross; they tear Him with thorns, pierce Him with nails, load Him with reproaches.

If thou art one of those, cry Hosannah as long as thou wilt, thou art a Pilate, a Jew, a Judas, an executioner of the Lord of life; and so much greater shall thy judgment be, by how much thy light and His glory is more.

Oh, beloved, is it not enough that He died once for us? Were those pains so light that we should every day redouble them? Is this the entertainment that so gracious a Saviour hath deserved of us by dying? Is this the recompense of that infinite love of His, that thou shouldest thus cruelly vex and wound Him with thy sins? Every of our sins is a thorn, and nail, and spear to Him; while thou despisest His poor servants, thou spittest in His face; while thou

puttest on thy proud dresses, and liftest up thy vain heart with high conceits, thou settest a crown of thorns on His head; while thou wringest and oppressest His poor children, thou whippest Him and drawest blood of His hands and feet. An hypocrite art thou if thou darest offer to receive the sacrament of God with that hand which is thus imbrued with the blood of Him whom thou receivest.

Hear Him that saith, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?" Saul strikes at Damascus; Christ suffers in heaven. Thou strikest; Christ Jesus smarteth, and will revenge. These are the afterings of Christ's sufferings. In Himself it is "finished;" in His members it is not, till the world be finished. We must toil, and groan, and bleed that we may reign; if He had not done so, it had not been "finished." This is our warfare; this is the religion of our sorrow and death. Now are we set upon the sand pavement of our theatre, and are matched with all sorts of evils: evil men, evil spirits, evil accidents, which is worst, our own evil hearts; temptations, crosses, persecutions, sicknesses, wants, infamies, death; all these must in our courses be encountered by the law of our profession. What should we do but strive and suffer, as our General hath done, that we may reign as He doth, and once triumph in our Consummatum est (It is finished)? God and His angels sit upon the clouds of heaven, and behold us; our crown is ready; our day of delivery shall come; yea, our redemption is near; when all tears shall be wiped from our eyes, and we that have sown in tears shall reap in joy. In the mean time let us possess our souls not in patience only, but in comfort; let us adore and magnify our Saviour in His sufferings, and imitate Him in our own. Our sorrows shall have an end; our joys shall not: our pains shall soon be finished; our glory shall be finished, but never ended.*

THE BELIEVER'S CRUCIFIXION TO THE

WORLD..

CHRIST'S death is the pattern of the believer's crucifixion to the world. The life of Christ in the world, in poverty, in the form of a servant, has poured scorn upon all the grandeur, riches, and honours of it. The King of heaven, when He dwelt here upon earth, did not think them worth taking. The manner of His death and burial has poured contempt upon everything that is magnificent in death, upon all the pomps of funerals and the honours of the grave. He hung upon the cross and submitted to death in the most dishonourable way, by dying like a malefactor or a slave; His body was begged and conveyed away to a private sepulchre in a garden, though He might have had the attendance of mourning angels and all the show of heaven waiting at His funeral. All this was appointed, to humble the pride of man, to make us see that there is nothing in all the vanities of life desirable. Our Head has despised them all.*

THOSE WHO SUFFER WITH CHRIST SHALL

REIGN WITH CHRIST.

WHEN We see Omnipotence hanging upon the cross, and God Himself scourged and spit upon; and when we see Him who could have commanded fire from heaven and legions of angels to His rescue, yet surrendering Himself quietly to the will

of His murderers, surely no mortal man can pretend himself too great and too high to suffer. Again, when we behold virtue, innocence, and purity more than angelical, crucified between thieves and malefactors, shall any man whose birth and actions revile and speak him a sinner to his face, think himself too good to come under the cross, and to take his share in the common lot of Christianity? It is not the suffering itself, but the cause of it, that is dishonourable. And even in the worst and most shameful of sufferings, though the hangman does the execution, yet it is the crime alone which does the disgrace. Christ commands us nothing, but He enforces it with arguments from His person as well as from His word; and it is well if we can make a due use of them. For God knows how soon He may call us from our easy speculations and theories of suffering, to the practical experience of it; how soon He may draw us forth for persecution and the fiery trial. Only this we may be sure of, that if these things be brought upon us for His honour, it will be for ours too to endure them. And be our distresses never so great, our calamities never so strange and unusual, yet we have both our Saviour's example to direct and His promise to support us, who has left it upon record in His everlasting gospel, "that if we suffer with Him, we shall also reign with Him." †

children of the village. Wherever there was the darkness of want, thither she went, like a ray of sunshine, bearing hope and peace. To the widow and the fatherless she was a constant friend, and her whole life showed that the truths she taught welled up from the experience of her own heart.

As the youth grew older, he began to be courted for his eloquence; and, whenever the popular assembly and the critical audience met together, he was to be found, the most learned of all the learned men, and the most oratorical of all the orators. Many persons feared him, because of his satire; but they sought his society because of the esteem in which he was held by the people. Yet as a pastor, an instructer of the ignorant, one who tended the lambs of his Master's flock, he did nothing. He had sought the applause of men, and had found it. After awhile, ill and weary, he returned

to the home of his boyhood. And there, like an angel of mercy, the companion of his youthful days waited on him. From her he learned the uselessness of what he had been teaching others, and from her hands he once more received the bread of life. Then the spirit of a little child returned to him, and he found that it is not the one who knows most of the splendour of the city of God, nor he who can teach the most eloquently in the Master's name, but that it is the one who does most for Him and lives in the continual remembrance of His service, who is accepted in His kingdom.

Has this a spiritual significance ?

As the preacher forgot his great mission, so do we often forget the work our heavenly Master would have us do. And as the unknown village maiden handed him the bread of life, so does He often employ those whom we little esteem to be the ministers of our recall.

LATIMER.

ONE of the chief names in English Church history is that of Master HUGH LATIMER, a popular and eloquent expounder of God's truth, a fervent Christian, a bold hero in his Master's cause, who by Divine grace was enabled to resist even to the death the attempts of his enemies to silence him or change his opinions. He was born in or about the year 1491, at Thurcaston in Leicestershire, where his father rented a farm, and lived the life of an honest "yeoman," faithful to his king, for whom he fought, and, what is more important, careful to bring up his family "in godliness, and fear of God." At the age of four years, little Hugh's "ready, prompt, and sharp wit"-a characteristic of our worthy throughout his after-life-induced his father to send him first to school and ten years later to Cambridge University, in order that his powers of mind might be fully developed. Nor had this excellent father been less solicitous for his son's physical training, as we learn from

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"In

a sermon which Latimer preached before King Edward VI. in 1549. my time," he says, my poor father was as diligent to teach me to shoot as to learn any other thing, and so I think other men did their children. He taught me how to draw, how to lay my body in my bow, and not to draw with strength of arms as other nations do, but with strength of the body. I had bows bought me according to my age and strength; as I increased in them, so my bows were made bigger and bigger; for men shall never shoot well except they be brought up in it. It is a goodly art, a wholesome kind of exercise, and much commended in physic." The Cambridge University, like other similar institutions in Europe at that time, was still enslaved to the useless teachings of the "schoolmen,"-Duns Scotus, Thomas Aquinas, and their fellows-whose learning may be said to have been almost worse than ignorance. But light in sacred and profane scholarship was already beginning to dawn; eminent men, notably the witty and