some to Jesus, that he may "take them in his arms, and put his hands upon them, and bless them." With her will abide faith, hope and charity. Faith, the sustainer, bearing up the faltering footsteps where an arm of flesh would fail to support; hope, the purifier, casting her anchor where her bow of promise is, within the veil; and Charity, divine, ennobling charity, enlarging as it fills the heart, and kindling within a light to shine as the brightness of the firmament, when prophecies shall fail, when tongues shall cease, and when knowledge shall vanish away.

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Shall the believer in Christ, called by his name and devoted to his service, be lonely? Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive the things which God hath prepared for them that love him." This was spoken of the present enjoyments to which a Christian is admitted, and not exclusively of the future happiness of the saints, and in conformity with this is the assertion of Christ, that none are called to make sacrifices for his sake, who will not receive an hundred-fold more in this life, besides the recompense of the eternal inheritance, and it would be a very erroneous mode of judging, to estimate the happiness of life from its external circumstances.

'Gales from heaven, if so He will,
Sweeter melodies can wake,

On the lonely mountain rill,

Than the meeting waters make:
Who hath the Father and the Son
May be left, but not alone.'

One more consideration may serve to reconcile the solitary traveller on the road to Zion, to the path appointed for her. There is a valley in that way so

strait and narrow, that it admits not of companionship. It is dark and terrible, and fearful are the conflicts which are sometimes sustained on its entrance. The arm of affection may accompany the shrinking soul to the very confines of this valley, but it can go no further. Alone, alone the traveller must proceed. The hour of greatest need is the hour when her main aid is hopeless.

'Why should we faint and fear to live alone,
Since all alone, so heaven has willed, we die.'

Why should we in life cling to any other hope than that which, in death, alone can save us? One with Christ, and Christ with us, what shall separate us from his love? "Neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

ABSENCE.

THE waters bear thy ship
Far, far away!

I see her bowsprit's dip,
Scattering the spray :
Thine eyes are on these hills,
Their summits fade,
The mist the valley fills,
Deepening in shade!

A happy home thou'st left:
In its lone hall,

Now of thy voice bereft,

No echoes fall;

Sadness is on each cheek,

And falling tears Most eloquently speak What grief is theirs!

But yet one little day

Will change the scene,

And all will be as they

Have ever been:

The harp, when day is hid,

Will wake the air,

Gaily as erst it did

When thou wert there!

This world hath many a home
And lov'd fireside,

Where kindly thoughts may come

And long abide :

But, oh! 'tis not our rest,

Where'er we range

We find, on earth at best,

Change-nought but change!

M. A. S. BARBER.

EDUCATION.

THE activity and perseverance of the Romish party in Parliament have given them another step in advance. The motion of Mr. Wyse the Romish member for Waterford, which was lost in a Committee of the House of Commons last year, and lost also in the House itself, has this year been adopted by the Government, and a Board of National Education formed; for the consideration of all matters affecting the education of the people.'

The first result of this is, to stop the annual grants made for the last five years, for the purposes of education, or rather, to stop the distribution of them, as heretofore, by the Treasury. Not being able to devise any other plan of distribution, the Lords of the Treasury have adopted the plan of dispensing the grant through the medium of the two established Societies, the National, and the British and Foreign School. In this mode, no partiality was shewn, but just so much money was given to each Society, as the members or clients of that Society raised to meet the grant. If the dissenters had raised the most, the dissenters would have received the most. But it happened otherwise. The Church Societies have raised, during the last five years, about £75,000 for building schools, and have consequently received three-fourths of the parliamentary grant. With this, however, though the disproportion was entirely