The Book-Shelf. BRIEF NOTICES OF BOOKS. THE HISTORY OF THE SUNDAY others altogether misapprehend its character, object, and labours. SCHOOL UNION. By William Nothing could be more opportune than the appearance of this work. It forms a fit Jubilee memorial, and supplies the information many will be asking for when the Union and its affairs are being so prominently brought out to notice. We have read it with great interest, and would commend it to the attention of all Sunday school teachers throughout the country. For the past fifty years, the Sunday School Union has pursued a quiet and unobtrusive course of usefulness; little known and spoken of comparatively with other great societies, and never seeking to obtrude its labours upon the public eye. Unknown it is yet to many who are ignorantly reaping large benefits from its labours; and even opposed by some who, did they know it, are receiving aid from its efforts in the Sunday school cause. The past year's labours in behalf of the Jubilee fund, bringing some of us into close contact with various parties through the land, have elicited an amount of misapprehension and ignorance about the Sunday School Union we had no idea existed. What it is; what its mission is; what it has done or is capable of doing, many know nothing of; while Now, one of the benefits resulting from the Jubilee effort has been to set these matters right with many; and this Jubilee memorial, we trust, will do good service in setting them right with many more. In it will be found a deeply interesting narrative of its beginning, when, fifty years ago, that band of holy men (of whom only three survive) met in the Surrey Chapel schoolroom, and resolved to form a union to aid the then newly invented Sunday schools in various ways;— a development of the true character and spirit of that union, as seen in its original constitution and after doings, proving it to be an active evangelical alliance of christians of all evangelical denominations, with a definite object and for a special end; -an unvarnished story of the progress and labours of that union in the producing of various useful and important publications adapted to the wants of the schools; the gathering together and diffusing interesting information regarding the doings and condition of the whole enterprise, for the instruction and encouragement of its friends; the raising and granting of funds for the erection of suitable schoolrooms, or establishment of schools in needy districts, without regard to sect or party; the formation of lending and other says, libraries, which it has supplied at one-third the retail price; the improvement of the Sunday school system, and the better fitting of the teachers for their work; the instigation and encouragement of other noble kindred institutions; the provision of a healthy periodical litera-highly gifted hand, make up the ture for our children, youth, and teachers; and the aid afforded by it on various occasions in promoting great religious movements, and standing against various measures which would have marred the full liberty or efficiency of Sunday school labours through the country;-and a fair exhibition of the Sunday School Union amongst the other evangelical institutions of our land, designed for the up-raising and sanctification of the masses of the people. This is the material of the book, and we are glad that our teachers have now in such form before them matters of such moment and interest to them all. The work is, moreover, illustrated by excellent engraved portraits of Robert Raikes, W. B. Gurney, W. Fox, W. F. Lloyd, &c. The work, if fairly read, must do good service to both the Sunday School Union, and the great enterprise with which it stands connected. THE MOTHER'S FRIEND; a Monthly We have already spoken in high terms of this very useful periodical, and consider it still the best of its class for the working mothers of our land, "who have," as Ann Jane contents of each number. No mother can ever open these pages but she will find something to do her good, or help her in her work, and we give them, lend them, and recommend them constantly on every hand. To us, however, all this commendation seems useless, as the work is so well known; but should any mother not chance to have it, whose eye may catch this notice, she will thank us for it. NECESSITY AND CONTRIVANCE; or, Food, Clothing, and Shelter. By the Author of "Wayside Fragments;" Village Scenery," &c. London: Religious Tract Society. A very charming book, especially for boys, full of information, and lit up with a most cheerful and withal a christian spirit. Parents cannot do better than give the work to their thinking and ingenious boys. REMARKABLE ESCAPES FROM A deeply interesting and exceedingly taking book. Our young folks will be delighted with it, and we hope vastly benefited. Throughout, God the great deliverer is brought out to notice, and his hand traced in every mercy recorded. We cannot speak too highly of such forms of setting the great truths belonging to a special providence before the minds of our youth in this too godless age, when the doctrine is being lost amid "the lucky hits," and "happy turns" in life which many talk of. Chapter of Varieties. NOTHING IS LOST. The drop that mingles with the flood-the sand dropped on the seashore-the word you have spokenwill not be lost. Each will have its influence, and be felt till time shall be no more. Have you ever thought of the effect that might be produced by a single word? Drop it pleasantly among a group, and it will make a dozen happy, to return to their homes to produce the same effect on a hundred, perhaps. A bad word may arouse the indignation of a whole neighbourhood; it may spread like wild-fire, to produce disastrous effects. As no word is lost, be careful how you speak; speak right, speak kindly. The influence you may exert by a life of kindness-by kind words, holy words, dropped among the young and the old-is incalculable. It will not cease when your bodies lie in the grave, but will be felt wider and still wider, as years pass away. Who, then, will not exert himself for the welfare of millions? SELFISHNESS UNCHRISTIAN. Live for some purpose in the world. Act your part well. Fill up the measure of your duty to others. Conduct yourself so that you shall be missed with sorrow when you are They gone. Multitudes of our species are living in such a selfish manner, that they are not likely to be remembered after their disappearance. leave behind them scarcely any traces of their existence, but are forgotten almost as though they had never been. They are, while they live, like one pebble lying unobserved amongst a million on the shore; and when they die they are like that same pebble thrown into the sea, which just ruffles the surface, sinks, and is forgotten, without being missed from the beach. They are neither regretted by the rich, wanted by the poor, nor celebrated by the learned. Who has been the better of their life? Who has been the worse of their death? Whose tears have they dried up? whose wants supplied? whose miseries have they healed? Who would unbar the gate of life, to readmit them to existence? or what face would greet them back again to our world with a smile? Wretched, unproductive mode of existence ! Selfishness is its own curse; it is a starving vice. The man who does no good gets none. He is like the heath in the desert, neither yielding fruit, nor seeing when good cometh; a stunted, dwarfish, miserable shrub. -Rev. J. A. James. Part of the Ruins of Glastonbury Abbey CHAPTERS FROM THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF BRITAIN. CHAPTER VIII.-THE ANGLO-SAXON CHURCH. WE have before remarked that the Christianity set up amidst the heptarchy in England was of no very pure or elevated character. Most of the princes who embraced it did so with little evidence, if any, of true conversion, and the majority of the nobles and people that followed, followed from interested motives. The boasted rapid establishment of Christianity was not a thing for spiritually-minded men much to rejoice about, while within a very brief period after that establishment such a state of irreligion was exhibited that, save from the improvement in civilization and letters, it became questionable whether the people were blessed or cursed by the change in their religion. It would be a long chapter that BIBLE CLASS MAGAZINE.] [SEPTEMBER, 1853. K traced the growth of this corruption and decline. It must suffice to give one or two of its features and forms. The church had become rich. From being wholly dependent on the voluntary alms of the faithful, it became possessed of large revenues. Part of these arose from the exaction of tithes by law, now for the first time imposed, first in Mercia, and soon after in all the kingdoms; and part from large endowments and gifts made by kings and rich thanes, who were taught to believe that costly offerings when living, and large legacies when dying, would fully expiate their sins. With these revenues the church became worldly. The clergy, from being an apparently poor and humble class of men, were elevated into proud and lordly priests, and sought to vie in pomp and luxury with the greatest in the land. Everything, too, in the forms and worship was made conformable to this worldly position. The churches, formerly of the plainest character, were now adorned with paintings or hung with tapestry. The altars were richly cut, and they and the "sacred vessels " made of the precious metals and set with precious stones. The vestments of the priests were of the most splendid description. Great pomp and splendour were sought in the services of the church, and imposing ceremonies introduced. The plain and simple teaching of the first preachers was given up. A mysterious and unintelligible style of pulpit address was adopted, and the grossest errors and superstitions taught. Nor was this all. Ignorance, indolence, and sensuality took the place of learning, activity, and morality amongst the clergy. The monasteries became the abodes of every vice, and the nunneries receptacles of profligates. It is declared by the historians of that day that so profligate were the lives of these so-called religionists that princes, wishing to live lives of uninterrupted vice, often founded an abbey, of which they became the abbot, and gathered round them a body of dissolute monks, with whom they lived in the commission of every crime; and that their wives, acting in like manner, established nunneries, which they made the dwellings of the most immoral of their sex. Along with these corruptions superstition made rapid strides. The guilty consciences of some of these profligates would sometimes awake, and penances, alms, pilgrimages, prayers, and other like expiations, were resorted to to win the |