when Peter Dens was introduced to our acquaintance, has commenced its active operation. Its object is not to follow up the theological controversy with Rome, but to keep alive a due sense of the vital principle inseparably interwoven with our constitution in Church and State-and this is essentially Protestant. Similar demonstrations preceded the great contest which ended in establishing, on the English throne, him who has been cast from his elevation a century and a half too late for the purposes of his valiant assailers!

Two grand bodies of political Conservatives have also met, in London, after the true John Bull fashion, to eat and drink in testimony of their devotion to Church and King. The two great Tory leaders, were absent; but it does not appear that any chasm was thereby felt. Indeed, it is much to be wished that one of them had contentedly sat down under the shade of his well-earned laurels, to bask in the grateful love of a country to which he had rendered most brilliant service in the field; and that the other had never wandered into the perilous ziz-zag of timid expediency, to gain a height from whence, alas! he can only look down on the ruin of England's best bulwark. He might have rested beside it, with far more credit to himself, even though it were upon a lower ledge of the mountain than that which he now occupies. "Cease ye from man," is a lesson that the Conservatives of this empire have much need to lay to heart.

Some bright spots, however, appear on the distant horizon, to cheer us when saddened by the cloudy aspect at home. One of these is gleaming in the great city of the Seven Hills-the very seat of Anti

christ-the habitation of his unholy throne. In Rome itself, a work is going on, delightful to contemplate, when we consider the value of a single soul. There are in Rome, a number of poor Protestants of different countries, who, in cases of sickness, have no resource but to go into an hospital. The only building of this description is one so decidedly and exclusively Popish, that no Protestant minister is allowed to enter it; and the poor, when compelled to take refuge there, are placed entirely at the mercy of those who well know how to wield the terrors both of this world and the next against their faith.

The German congregation (who does not think of Martin Luther when reading it?) have established an institution for the benefit of these poor Protestants. The Pope expressed great displeasure at the proceeding; and if the thunders of the Vatican retained even a small portion of their former power, they would have annihilated it forthwith. The King of Prussia, however, interposed his mediation, verifying the sincerity of his purpose by a noble gift— taking on himself, to pay, for five years, the rent of the Casa Marescotti, a capacious house on the Tarpeian Rock, which his Majesty's envoy, Chevalier Bunsen, has engaged for the purpose. Out of 2600l., the estimated expence of the establishment, no less than 2,150l. have been collected; leaving only 4507. short of the required sum. The superintendant of the hospital also undertakes to direct the education of children of poor Protestant families, residing at Rome: thus securely fencing in the little lambs, even under the nose of the Wolf. A supply of Bibles and other religious books, is provided by the German

congregation. Thus is the Lord manifesting that He careth for the poor; and happier are they, who, in pursuit of their humble callings, have been unwittingly brought into this perilous contact, than the rich, who, in the wantonness of curiosity, or the vagrancy of taste, have placed themselves within the enchanted circle. Cardinal Weld is exceedingly busy, in decoying these stragglers; and many are, through his devices, either entangled altogether in the net, or so deeply imbued with the spirit of unbounded latitudinarianism in religion, as to become most valuable auxiliaries in spreading the plague at home. Never was Popery more active than now: the weapons of violence being wrested from her hands, she is necessitated to work every engine of craft and subtlety and she does it with a zeal, a perseverance, and success, strongly illustrative of the remark made by Bishop Newton, in his Dissertation on the Prophecies; who, showing that Popery would, about this time, receive a death-wound, adds that its struggles, like those of a dying monster, would be terrible and dangerous. Wounded it unquestionably is, and that mortally: the sword that goeth out of the mouth of the Lord, hath smitten it; and it has begun to consume away. But until the brightness of His coming shall bring utter destruction to the resisting foe, we must expect to receive many a heavy contusion from its convulsed and desperate movements. No beast is so tenacious of life as that scarlet-coloured Beast-no captives held in so tight a chain, as the poor perishing souls shut up in its darksome den. It is not against those souls that we utter the language of incessant denunciation, but

against their enemy who keeps them from Christ. Of every one among them we fervently say, May the Lord grant deliverance! May he translate them from darkness to light-from the power of Satan to the kingdom of God!

THE

CHRISTIAN LADY'S MAGAZINE.

JUNE, 1836.

BY-GONE DAYS..

OWING to the extreme darkness expected during the eclipse, there will be no afternoon service to-day,' said the parish clerk, at the close of morning prayers on Sunday the 15th of May, 1836. Deep and rather strange was the emotion excited by that simple announcement, as the words of our Lord passed rapidly through my mind," If the light within thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!" And far removed from idle curiosity were the feelings with which I sallied forth, ere the shadow had well touched the verge of the sun's disc, to pass in a retired field the season of his obscuration.

The day was brilliant, and even oppressively warm. It breathed a fragrance and a balm that spoke of sunnier climes, and filled me with solemn thoughts of that miraculous eclipse which darkened Judea, when the orb averted his shining face from the awful spec