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Hall's life was one of the most eloquent examples of patient continuance in well. doing. In our next number we hope to present our readers with some account of his history and character.

Church Building: its Perils and Privileges. A Sermon preached at the Congregational Church, Surbiton, on Sunday, Dec. 18, 1864. By the Rev. ALEX. MACKENNAL, B.A. London: Jackson, Walford, and Hodder.

A WORD in season, which deserves to be pondered thoughtfully and devoutly by all who are engaged in "church building." "We may find," the preacher says, "that attention to minute details, and the wear and tear of the business engagements in which we shall be involved, threaten to impoverish our spirits, tend to call us from communion with God and meditation on His truth. What then? Though this is, a temptation, it is by no means a necessity. The danger is here, but not only may the danger be averted, our work may itself lead us into fuller communion with God, into deeper earnest. ness in personal spiritual life, and the life of the Church. How shall we avoid the danger? how improve our undertaking as a means of grace?" These questions the preacher answers with great beauty and force.

The Religious Annals of Brentwood; with a brief History of the Origin and Progress of Protestant Nonconformity in that Town. By the Rev. H. P. BOWEN. Second Edition. London: John Wesley and Co.

SUCH books possess more than a local interest. They form the staple of which general history is composed, and often give a more vivid impression of men, manners, and times, than works of wider compass.

The Ploughman of Kilmany; a brief Memoir of Alexander Paterson. London: Dublin Tract Depository.

THIS is an abridgment of the Rev. J.
Baillie's k
Missionary of Kilmany," and
deserves a very large circulation.

Lays of the Future; Comfort to the Sad;
Peace on Earth; Glory in the Highest.
By WILLIAM LEASK. London: S. W.
Partridge.

THIS is a second edition-an honour which all books of poetry do not attain.

We do

not believe, as Dr. Leask does, in "the pre-millennial coming of the Lord Jesus;" and there is, therefore, much in his volume with which we cannot sympathise. And yet there is much in his graceful, flowing numbers in reference to which the hearts of all Christians are one.

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The Imperial Bible Dictionary.
Rev. P. FAIRBAIRN, D.D.
Blackie and Son. Part XV.
THIS part includes from "Lord's Supper"
to "Matthew."

Parable or Divine Poesy. Part II. London: Pitman.

THIS part contains extracts on subjects arranged alphabetically from " Assurance" to" Benevolence."

A Handbook of Christian Baptism. By R. INGHAM. London: Simpkin, Mar. shall, and Co.

66

THIS is an entire misnomer. It is a handbook," neither in size nor in spirit. In size it is a closely packed, large octavo volume of 640 pages. And in spirit, in stead of being an impartial statement and balancing of arguments on both sides of the controversy, touching modes and subjects, it is an eager and narrow piece of special pleading throughout. We differ from its conclusions toto cœlo.

We have received the following works of fiction, of which we have not space to say more than that they are all written in a Christian spirit, and with a direct aim to do good:

Thornycroft Hall: its Owners and its
Heirs. By EMMA JANE WORBOISE.
London: Christian World Office.
Joe Witless: or, the Call to Repentance.
London: Morgan and Chase.
Frank Fielding. By AGNES VEITCH. Edin-
burgh: Johnstone and Hunter.
The Children of the Great King. A tale
of the Crimean War. Edinburgh:
Johnstone and Hunter.

By the Trent. Prize Tale. By Mrs. E. S.

OLDHAM, Scottish Temperance League,

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RESIGNATIONS.

J. Tayler, Anvil-street, Bristol.

E. Edmunds, Ruabon.

J. Cummins, Elsecar.

G. H. White, Great Horton.

J. T. Gale (Baptist), Putney, Union Ch.
G. W. Brownjohn, Redcar.

DEATHS OF MINISTERS.

Jan. 7.-Hugh Hughes; Aberdare.
Feb. 21.-S. A. Davies; Camberweli.
Feb. 26.-S. Ellis; Wilmslow. Aged
sixty-four. Ministry forty-one years.

Feb. 27.-J. Griffiths; Blodwell. Aged eighty.

Dec.-W. Day; Hobart Town. Aged seventy. Ministry twenty-five years. March 9.-G. W. Barrett, late of Croydon.

DEATHS OF MINISTERS' WIVES. Feb. 27.-Mrs. Isaac Sloper (Widow); Beccles.

March 1.-Mrs. J. Wood; Harpurhey, Manchester.

March 3.-Mrs. H. Birch, Great Driffield.

THE ANNUAL MEETING of the Trustees and Managers of the Christian Witness Fund will be held in the Congregational Library, Blomfield Street, on Monday, the 8th of May next, at Twelve o'clock.

CONGREGATIONAL UNION OF ENGLAND AND WALES.-The next Annual Assembly will be held in the Weigh-House Chapel, on Tuesday morning, the 9th of May, and by adjournment, in the same place on the following Friday. The Rev. DAVID THOMAS, B.A., of Bristol, Chairman of the Union, will preside. Dinner will be provided each day, for Ministers and Delegates from the Country, at the Bridge House Hotel.

"THE HOG'S PRAYER" OF THE KENT BOY.

AT a recent meeting of the Kent Congregational Association, the Secretary stated that a friend had kindly sent him a copy of the so-called Hog's or Pig-boy's prayer, referred to by the Rev. E. Hoare at the Islington Clerical Meeting, as mentioned in our late paper on "Our Congregational Missions and Evangelists." The prayer itself he found to consist simply of a row of Roman numerals, with a rude figure of a pig-boy, whip in hand, carved at the end. The numerals ran thus:

I-II-III-V-I-I-IIII-II-II-III-X-I-I.

Then comes the figure of the pig-boy. follows:

The translation of the whole is as

One before two, three before five,

Here one and there one, four alive;

Here two and there two, and three at the cross,
Here one and there one, and Jack at the last.

In explanation of this unmeaning jingle, the gentleman supplying it says: "It was given me by a neighbour who, nearly thirty years ago, used hundreds of times when engaged as a pig-boy, as did his grandfather before him. He resided at Wye, but he assured me he never used it as a prayer or act of devotion, and that he never heard of any one so using it. It was merely a piece of common rhyme, popular in this class of employment, it being common to cut the figures on the end of the rude whip-handles of local construction; and it appears to me unlikely that any have used it in a devotional way."

It may be so, and to this extent Mr. Hoare's proof of the heathenism of Kent fails. But we fear that abundant evidence still remains of practical heathenism in Kent, as in other English counties. And if there is, the greater the shame that Mr. Hoare should repudiate the aid of such men as constitute the Kent Congregational Association, who hold and preach the Gospel which is dear to his own heart.

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THOUGHTFUL men find both in providence and in the spiritual life something analogous to the counteracting and counterbalancing forces with which we are familiar in nature. "God hath set the day of prosperity over against the day of adversity." "He stayeth his rough wind in the day of his east wind." "As thy days, so shall thy strength be." Providential events are strikingly and beautifully balanced, not only as they apply to individuals and special cases, but when viewed upon a large scale, and generally. Human life is not one unbroken summer, neither is it one long dreary winter. We have cloudy days, but we have also sunny days. If we have heavy trial and much of it, we have a corresponding degree of consolation. We have strength for weakness, peace for trouble, light for darkness, the harp of the minstrel for the weapon of the warrior. The back is made for the burden it has to carry; or the burden is proportioned to the back that has to bear it. Many of those individuals who seem to a passing observer to have no trouble, are very often grievously afflicted; and those who appear to be tossed with tempest and not comforted, have often so many unseen mercies, and so much inward peace, that, after all, their lot is a most merciful one in itself, and will bear comparison with theirs whose portion is judged to be richer and much more propitious. So that, were all the facts, all the circumstances, and all the feelings of a number of individual Christians before us, we should, I have no doubt, be shut up to the conclusion that notwithstanding their providential diversities, sorrow and joy, peace and trouble, hope and disappointment, are more equally distributed than at a bare glance appears. The lot that Providence ordains for us is the best, and it is a striking proof of the equalizing power of Divine goodness.

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t: The same principle is manifest in Christian experience. Are some things against us, are not other things for us? Have we seasons of depression when we are cast down to the very dust ? Have we not, also, seasons of elevation, when, though with hearts overwhelmed, we are led to the rock that is higher than ourselves? Is ours a dark and cloudy day has it not as certainly been preceded, as it will most assuredly be succeeded, by a bright one? Have we seasons of exhaustion have we not seasons of repletion ? Have we times of weariness-have we not "times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord ?" Does "the enemy ever come in like a flood "--does not the Spirit of the Lord always lift up a standard against him?" Are we sometimes in the Valley of Achor does not the Lord then and there open to us a door of hope? Have we a desert-like experience of the world, and of our evil hearts have we not also a garden-like experience of God's love, of the Saviour's presence, and of the Holy Spirit's consolations? Are we familiar with crooked things and with rough places has not our heavenly Father promised, and does He not at the right time, and in the right way, fulfil His promise, to make "crooked things straight, and rough places plain ?",

"

It is likewise true of the inward spiritual conflict, that while we have hindrances, we have helps; and that although we have many a check to keep us back and to draw us down, we have many an impulse to send us forwards and upwards. "Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, and these are contrary the one to the other so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law." Here is an admission, humiliating and discouraging. But here also is a fact, encouraging and emboldening. Now, let us not take a partial, but an impartial view of this case. The flesh is contrary to the Spirit. The flesh does oppose the Spirit. The Spirit, therefore, is hindered, and its intentions are often frustrated by the flesh. "I find another law in my members warring against the law of my mind. The good that I would I do not. The evil which I would not, that I do." And in consequence of this we are com pelled to exclaim, "O, wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death ?"

All this is true, fearfully true; and we humble ourselves before God on account of it. But let us remember that the conflict in which we are engaged, and of which we complain, implies, by very necessity, the existence of two opposing powers-darkness and light-light and darkness. And this is the point to which I wish especially to draw attention; that if the opposition of one of these contending forces is a cause of distress, the opposition of the other is a reason for being joyful. We are not free from the influence of the flesh, neither are we free from the influence of the Spirit. And we may assure ourselves that as the flesh is aided by the Wicked One, the spirit is aided by the Righteous One; and that, therefore, hope, not despondency faith, not distrust, ought to preponderate. And yet how often do we feel, think, judge, and act just as if all the life, all the energy, all the wisdom, and all available moral auxiliaries were with the flesh; as if the flesh were

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