with the duty of helping Ireland through the channel of the parochial clergy. It is clearly proved that relief given through the Popish priests does not always equally benefit the Protestants, while it is admitted on all sides, that the relief entrusted to Protestants is impartially distributed amongst Roman Catholics and Protestants.

But this is not all. There is the greatest reason to fear that the faithful and devoted clergy of Ireland may sink under the pressure of their heavy burdens: too heavy indeed to bear, they may well prove, both to the clergy and their families! How important, then, to uphold them at their posts, and to prevent the overwhelming misery of being conversant with increasing famine and wretchedness, which they have not the means to arrest !

We are assured that by far the most effectual and satisfactory relief which can be given, is that which is sent direct to the clergy in suffering districts. The best plan is, to seek out these which are little known, and are suffering in silence. The pub

lished cases are enjoying adequate relief.

Let English individuals or parishes resolve to adopt an Irish parish. The Editor has done this, and has selected the parish of Listowel, in the county of Kerry, where, in addition to all the other good progressing, a Scripture reader alone has been the means of above seventy persons, chiefly in the higher walks of life, coming out of the church of Romelawyers, surgeons, &c.—and who have lost their all in consequence. The Editor will be very thankful to recommend other destitute localities for adoption. He is in daily correspondence with Ireland, and will be glad to render any service in this matter.

We will only add, that full confidence may be placed in the right disposal of all money sent to "The Irish Relief Association for the Destitute Peasants," 16, Upper Sackville Street, Dublin, of which the Duke of Manchester, Lord Roden, &c., are patrons. The Editor will gladly transfer any sums direct to the clergy in the most needy districts.

OUR readers are aware that the directors of the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway, have lately discontinued the practice of running trains on the Lord's Day. This step has excited a great deal of discussion in Scotland. The Town Councils of Edinburgh, Leith, and Linlithgow, have petitioned the directors to return to their former practice, and resume the Sunday trains. To strengthen the hands of the directors, and encourage them in their resistance to Sabbath profanation, a meeting, numerously and most respectably attended, was held at Edinburgh on the 22nd December last. From the speeches delivered on that occasion, we beg to select and recommend to our readers' notice, the statements of Professor Miller, an eminent surgeon of Edinburgh. We wish especially to call the attention of our medical readers to the professor's remarks.

We beg to remind English shareholders in Scotch railways, what a

responsibility lies upon them in the present struggle.

Professor Miller, in seconding the resolution, begged to read an extract from the "Minutes of Evidence before the Select Committee of the House of Commons, on the Observance of the Sabbath, 1832,"—the evidence of Dr. Farre, a physician not more distinguished for professional eminence and skill, than for his shrewdness and sound common sense. He states that he had been forty years in practice as a physician, and that he had been "in the habit, during a great many years, of considering the uses of the Sabbath, and of observing its abuses." And that he had come to the conclusion that the "alternating of night with day" is not more essential for the wellbeing of the physical frame of man, than is the cessation from all labour one day in seven. In fact, that the machinery of man, in one respect, resembled that of an eight-day clock;

he runs out if not wound up regularly once a week; and the process of winding up requires twenty-four hours for its due completion. "One day in seven," says he, "by the bounty of Providence, is thrown in as a day of compensation, to perfect by its repose the animal system. You may easily determine this question as a matter of fact by trying it on beasts of burden. Take that fine animal, the horse, and work him to the full extent of his powers every day in the week, or give him rest one day in seven, and you will soon perceive, by the superior vigour with which he performs his functions on the other six days, that this rest is necessary to his well-being. Man, possessing a superior nature, is borne along by the very vigour of his mind, so that the injury of continued diurnal exertion and excitement on his animal system is not so immediately apparent as it is in the brute; but in the long-run he breaks down more suddenly: it abridges the length of his life and that vigour of his old age, which (as to mere animal power) ought to be the object of his preservation. I consider, therefore, that, in the bountiful provision of Providence for the preservation of human life, the Sabbatical appointment is not, as it has been sometimes theologically viewed, simply a precept partaking of the nature of a political institution, but that it is to be numbered amongst the natural duties, if the preservation of life be admitted to be a duty, and the premature destruction of it a suicidal act. This is said simply as a physician." So that, according to this authority, the man who compels his fellow-man to labour on the Sabbathday may be not guiltless of murder; and the man who assumes continuance of labour on that day to himself is not guiltless of self-murder. And he goes on to state, "I would point out the Sabbatical rest as necessary to man, and that the great enemies of the Sabbath, and consequently the enemies of man, are all laborious exercises of the body or mind, and dissipation, which forces the circulation on that day in which it should repose; whilst relaxation from the ordinary cares of life, the enjoyment of this

repose in the bosom of one's family, with the religious studies and duties which the day enjoins, not one of which, if rightly exercised, tends to abridge life, constitute the beneficial and appropriate service of the day." Hear this, ye working men of Edinburgh, for it is to you chiefly that the lure of Sabbath recreation, as it is called, but in truth Sabbath desecration,-is held out. "The great enemies of the Sabbath are consequently the great enemies of man.' Whether will you believe this experienced and accomplished physician and philosopher, or the unwise councillors who, whatever may be their information in other things, are certainly not expected to be adepts in physiology, or who may be no philosophers at all? Will you believe them, or this man, who speaks professionally as a physiologist, giving an opinion from "many years" " experience, and who lived and spoke at a time when it was impossible for his opinion to be warped or perverted by the influence of traffic in railway shares? And, further, he states, so strong is his impression of the necessity for a whole day's rest from labour, that in the case of clergymen, whose peculiar function it is to labour on the Sabbath-day, he has advised one day's rest for them (a Monday probably), in their case to be borrowed from the other six. "I have advised the clergyman, in lieu of his Sabbath, to rest one day in the week: it forms a continual prescription of mine. I have seen many destroyed by their duties on that day; and, to preserve others, I have frequently suspended them for a season from the discharge of those duties." And again, "the working of the mind in one continued train of thought is destructive of life in the most distinguished class of society, and that senators themselves stand in need of reform in that particular. I have observed many of them destroyed by neglecting this economy of life." No more need surely be said on the necessity of one day's rest in seven for the wellbeing of the physical frame of man. The question then comes to be, How is this day of immunity from ordinary labour to be most profitably employed?

Is it in sight-seeing, or in frequenting museums, as some of our senators in London would persuade ?—or is it in running to and fro in Sabbath trains, -scouring the country, its lanes and fields, and villages, as some of our wise men nearer home would have us to do? Are we to regulate our conduct in this matter,-the grave matter of the Sabbath's observance,-by any "glorious document" that may be furnished by a superintendent of police? Or are we to regulate our conduct by the one truly glorious document, which is wholly on our side, and with which we will crush every opposing document whatsoever,—Ï mean the word and will of God? It is very desirable that the experiment were tried, of the effect of Sabbathbreaking and Sabbath-keeping on the physical frame of man; or rather, that the trials which are being weekly made, had their results noted and made known. I fear not for the result. The steady, sober, Christian artizan, who each Sabbath morning rears his family altar,-who, with each service bell, wends his way to the house of God,-who, on each Sabbath evening, is found within his own home, pursuing the sacred domestic duties of the day, a day of rest,-not of slothful, but of holy rest,-is that man, on the second day of the week, when his ordinary round of toil has come back upon him, found more wan and weary, more enfeebled in body and relaxed in mind, than that other man who has spent his Sabbath from home,-I will not say in riot and dissipation, but in gaiety and gadding about in steam-boats, railways, or a field, in dissipation of time and mind at least, if not of other things? Surely not. The Sabbath-keeper will be found better than the Sabbathbreaker,-better in body, better in mind, better in person, better for time, and better for eternity. The air of the church, Sir, may feel less bracing to the frame, less playful on the cheek, than the open air of heaven on the hill-side, or amid fragant fields; but there are concomitants to each on the Sabbath-day; and it is these concomitants that sway the scale. The atmosphere of the house of God may feel even cold and dark, and almost

sepulchral, yet we doubt not it will prove more conducive than the other on the Sabbath-day towards the health of the physical as well as of the moral frame of man. Of two things we read in the sacred volume, and only two, each of which is said to be "a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation;" and one of these two things, so isolated and made prominent, is this, "That godliness"and surely the right observance of the Sabbath appertains to this,-" is profitable unto all things, having the promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come." One word of allusion, Sir, to the precious “document" of our opponents, the last in their list, containing a proposal, as has been wittily observed by another, of curing drunkenness by steam. What guarantee have they that the giddy crowds they pour forth in search of "Sabbath recreation," at each halting-place of the monster Sabbath train,-monster in every sense of the term,-may not there meet with greater lures to intemperance and subsequent riot than they might otherwise have been exposed to? This is no extinction, but an extention of the evil; at the best, only, as a lawyer would say, a change of Or if they should succeed in making some impression on intemperance, at least as witnessed in the near neighbourhood of our towns,— how is it? Only by substituting one offence against the law of God for another-desecration of the Sabbath for intemperance in drink. An illustration from the practice of medicine occurs to me here, counter-irritation. It is no bad plan to relieve a deepseated inflammation, by inducing one externally, as by the application of a blister to the skin. But what is so induced is as truly disease, as truly an inflammation, as the original evil. And were this to be fixed,stereotyped,- -on the part, it would form but a sorry boon to the patient. He might well grudge, for example, to be relieved from a pain of a limb, at the cost of carrying about with him a foul, fœtid, running sore for ever and a day. I am unwilling to detain the meeting, Sir; but I am anxious to say a word on the con

venue.

nexion of the medical profession with the question of Sabbath trains. An attempt has been made to make it appear, and the sympathies of the community have been attempted to be raised upon the subject,—that by stoppage of the Sabbath trains an insuperable obstacle must be thrown in the way of sending efficient medical aid, in cases of urgent sickness at a distance in the country. But it is to be remembered, that such things do not occur every day. It is not on every Sabbath, or on many Sabbaths, such emergencies are likely to happen. It is only in the case of long distances, moreover, that the use of the railway comes to be essential, or even expedient. In ordinary distances of five, ten, fifteen, or even twenty miles, the old system of posting will do quite well. An express comes, and it may want two hours of the stated time for the starting of a suitable train. Within twenty minutes a chaise is at the door; and within the time spoken of the destination may be reached. And it is important to observe, how many circumstances must occur together ere a just demand can be made upon the railway. There must be an urgent case of sickness; besides, it must be of such a nature as to demand metropolitan aid, besides, it must be at a long distance from town,-besides, it must be on the line of railway,—and, besides, it must happen on the Sabbath day. It has been said, Sir, that a long day's posting is more hurtful than the railway train, by reason of employing more hands in Sabbath labour. Compare one isolated event with another, and it may seem so. But, remember that the posting happens once in the six months, or thereby, while the other is to take place twice every Sabbath at the least; and, taking this into account, it requires no great skill in arithmetic to cast the balance, and find on which side it preponderates for good or for evil. But on this head, Sir, may we not take the comforting reflection, that such heavy afflictions by sickness as those we speak of are not the result of chance, but are the subject of arrangement by an all-wise and allmerciful Providence; and is it likely, Sir, that he will permit this arrange

ment to be such as to clash and contend against the faithful, persevering, and, thank God, not altogether unsuccessful strivings of his people to stem the tide of godlessness that is setting in upon the land, and to preserve his own day sacred and inviolate from such open and national profanation? But, Sir, when such emergencies do come, I would not have them unprovided for. Dr. Candlish has generously met them in one way,—I venture on the same subject. Let a discretionary power be vested in the superintendent of the railway station, and, on good cause shown to him of urgency, in life and death, in necessity and mercy, yet with stringent limitations to prevent abuse creeping in, let a special train be provided. This is sufficient to meet the case. It is not necessary, as has already been shown by Dr. Candlish, that the trains should be running statedly, on the chance of an emergency coming. To use the illustration so happily employed in Glasgow by Dr. Symington some years ago, on an occasion somewhat like this, suppose a house taken fire on the Sabbath,—it is most right and proper that the engines should be quickly on the spot, and that the firemen should exert their utmost to extinguish the flames. But it is not necessary that the whole fire-brigade, in full accoutrement, with all the fireengines in full working order, should parade our streets every Sabbath-day, once in the morning, and once in the evening, lest the contingency of a fire should by possibility occur, such fires and other urgencies being supposed, according to the new law, and happily hit upon by Dr. Candlish always to occur at the stated hours of eight in the morning, and five in the afternoon. It may still be objected by our opponents, that it is unfair to saddle the unfortunate patient or his friends with the extra expense of the special train. But to that I would answer, that it is only in the case of long distances, as already stated, that the urgency occurs; that long distances make large fees; and that, in the case of a large fee, the extra expense of a special train is not likely to be felt. But if it should, Sir, I think I may take upon me to say,

that the profession to which I have the honour to belong will rather that the deduction be made from their professional remuneration,-hard-earned, as it often is, by tear and wear of both body and mind, than that they should seem to stand in the way of the great and good object which you are this day met to forward. "Where there is a will there is a way." The will, I trust, will not be wanting, on the part of the medical profession, to forego any claim they may have, or may be supposed to have, or may be told they have, to travelling by Sabbath trains. And if they do, sure I am that a way will be opened up to them for doing very well without,— except in very few instances, these just sufficing to form exceptions for inculcation of the general rule. Not long ago, Sir, it was the custom for too many in the medical profession to regard the Sabbath as a day peculiarly suited, and set apart as it were, for the pursuit of their professional avocations. It was a day of visiting of hospitals, of operating in private,—a day when patients were likely to be at home, and, therefore a day of special visiting; and an excuse was sought to be found in such works being "of necessity and mercy." But a change in this respect has come, and is advancing. Often have I heard it of late remarked, and that, too, by members of the profession themselves,-that whereas for

merly the din of doctors' carriages scarcely ceased in our streets on the Sabbath forenoon, now scarce two of these vehicles are to be found in the whole day, and these not rolling from house to house, but each, perhaps, bearing its family freight to the house of God. It is no longer a day for special visiting; visits are studiously few; it is a blank day for operations; leisure is found for attendance on the public ordinances of religion; it is a day of rest, yet of duty; but the duty is not of a professional kind. This feeling, I believe to be on the increase. The members of the medical profession grow more and more unwilling that their professional labours should be exacted from them on the Sabbathday. And do not believe, Sir, that they will permit themselves to be made instruments, even by implication, in the hands of any body of towards Sabbath desecration. I am a humble member of that profession, and very unworthy to represent, this day, so noble a profession in so noble a cause; yet, unworthy as I am, I will venture to say, that that profession will not lend itself towards opposing you in the great and good work you have undertaken; but, on the contrary, will gladly join with you, heart and hand, in restoring to Scotland what was once her proud boast, the solemn, still, and wellkept Sabbath-day.

men,

WE must give entire the following admirable letter addressed to the Leeds Intelligencer. It is most important that the greatest publicity should be given to the workings of a system, which is endangering the best interests of the Gospel and the Church of England. It is impossible for any impartial person to contemplate fully the Leeds case, and to bring himself to the conclusion that the vicar satisfactorily exculpates himself. vicar of Leeds ranks prominently amongst the "borderers," who, in our estimation, are by far the most dangerous section of our church,

The

They bring others to the precipice and leave them to fall down, but are wary enough to hold back themselves. Whether they are disguising existing sentiments, or what through their influence others are more precipitately acting, Jesuitically disguising, until a more favourable period arrives for a fuller development, or whether they really have not advanced beyond what they avow, and sincerely regret the secessions to Rome, it is not always easy to say. Mr. Paley professed to be horrorstruck at his pupil's going over to Rome. Mr. Paley tells us that he often warned him against such