authority with which Christ has invested them, they ought to be contented with that pittance of power with which their people may please to invest them; that it is lawful and right for Christian communities, as such, to descend from the calm sublimity of Zion's holy height, and struggle in the arena of worldly politics with the sons of Mammon and of Mars. The rights of conscience are exaggerated and urged to the utter subversion of the law of love; and, in many instances, those Ministers who prophesy smooth things are made the idols of the multitudes; while such as dare to show "the people their sins, and the house of Israel their transgression," become the objects of popular hate, and are counted enemies because they declare the truth.

These things proclaim the enmity of the world to the truth as it is in Jesus. They prove that God is the only sure defence of his church; and they call on all her genuine friends to pray with all prayer in her behalf. Pray, my brethren, that God would wash away the remaining "filth of the daughter of Zion, and purge the blood of Jerusalem," by means of "the Spirit of judgment, and by the Spirit of burning," which he has permitted to come upon her; that he would "clothe his Priests with salvation, and make his people shout aloud for joy;" that he would make his word "like a fire, and like a hammer which breaketh the rock in pieces;" that he would give the different Christian communities to see, that their cause is a common cause, that their interests are common interests, and that their enemies, though called by different names, and armed with different weapons, are common enemies; and that he would revive his work both at home and abroad, to an extent commensurate with the sublime and comprehensive announcements of prophecy. While I prefer these requests in behalf of the church universal, permit me, in conclusion, to turn your prayerful attention to the circumstances of our own Connexion. It was a revival of pure and undefiled religion, in the last century, which gave birth to our societies; and our continued preservation and increase in the world are attributable to oftrepeated effusions of the Holy Spirit.

While other churches regard revivals as gracious singularities in their history, we ought to consider their frequent occurrence as essential to our very existence. Few persons join our communion till they are awakened from the sleep of nature; for our doctrines, as a whole, are such as natural men cannot receive; our discipline is such as they cannot, for any length of time, brook; and, as the chief term on which we admit to membership is a "desire to flee from the wrath to come," it is not to be expected they will seek admission till they feel themselves really exposed to wrath. If conversion-work, therefore, were to cease among us, the extinction of our societies, or a radical change in the spiritual character of our economy, would be inevitable. Fully convinced that Methodism, in its origin and progress, in its doctrines and discipline, is the work of God; and that above all other systems it is dependent upon his continued blessing; I implore you to give yourselves to prayer in its behalf.

Pray that a double portion of the Holy Spirit may rest upon our official men, that our breaches may be repaired, that our union may be consolidated, that our publications and plans of usefulness, both local and general, may be sanctified and blessed; and that a more entire devotedness to God, a more punctual attention to closet duties, and a larger measure of "the Spirit of power, of love, and of a sound mind," may be diffused among our people. Many of you support our funds with your money; and we are grateful for your liberality; but we beseech you to accompany and follow your benefactions with your prayers, and you will thereby render them doubly valuable. Not only pray that God would establish the work of our hands," when you enter into your closets, and approach the family altar; but unite with us in the prayermeetings of the society. These meetings are closely connected with the core of our piety as a people; the estimation in which they are held, or the neglect with which they are treated, is a fair criterion for estimating the spiritual state of a society. Many of the persons who are wounded under the word prove them to be a healing pool; and some of our purest and most extensive revivals have originated in them. It has sometimes been a cause of regret to me, that the more respectable members of our community have not generally given that countenance to these meetings which their importance in our economy demands. The result has been, much spiritual loss has been sustained by the individuals absenting themselves, and the meetings, being left to the management of the illiterate but pious poor, have not in all instances been characterized by that decorum and scriptural intelligence which ought to distinguish every part of the worship of God, and which are essential to the perpetuation and due improvement of great revivals. These evils you, my respected brethren, have an opportunity of remedying; and if you attempt the cure in the spirit of lowly dependence on divine aid, your own devotional feelings will be excited and sublimed; that shy distrust, too apt to creep in between the rich and the poor, will be destroyed; the character of these meetings will be raised, and their beneficial tendency increased; while, to an undefined extent, you will contribute to bring down showers of blessings on the whole Israel of God. A regard for your religious prosperity, for the salvation of your families, for the credit of the Connexion, and for the well-being of the church universal, induces me to press this subject on your attention. I am aware you have hinderances to grapple with, from which your poorer brethren are exempt, and the same regularity of attendance which may be binding on them cannot be expected from you. But, at the same time, much may be done, that has not been done, by the adoption of a systematic self-denial, and by a resolute endeavour to subordinate the affairs of time to the concerns of eternity; and, by the maintenance of a lively sense of your responsibility to God, and of the great influence which your example has on society, you may become like the remnant of Jacob, "as a dew from the Lord, as the showers upon the grass, that

tarrieth not for man, nor waiteth for the sons of men." "Brethren, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may have free course;" and that "the work of our hands" may be so "established" as to defy alike the devices of devils, and the opposition of men.

Some of you are unable to benefit the church to any extent in the way of pecuniary assistance, or of formal teaching, or of learned defence; yet you also may promote her prosperity by means of prayer. When God comes to answer the supplications of his people, he neither looks at the maturity of their age, nor the extent of their possessions, nor the sum of their literary attainments, but simply at the depth of their piety, and the compass of their faith. The man who prays in faith, "nothing doubting, nothing wavering," whether rich or poor, moves the arm that rules the universe; by the lifting up of his hands on the mountain, he controls the tide of victory in the valley; by his unutterable groanings, he brings down "the breath of life" upon the "dry bones" which lie scattered in appalling abundance over the valley of vision; by his interceding pleas, he places a barrier between guilty millions and the wrath of God; and by the same means he secures to the host of Israel the guidance of wisdom, the energy of power, the concord of love, and the joys of unity. That church which has the greatest number of praying persons in its communion has most power with God, and is likely to be most useful to men; and those works which are planned and perfected in the spirit of prayer are sure to have the establishing sanction of Him who is the "bearer of prayer." Come ye up, then, my brethren, "to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty." He needs your most strenuous services, and he will condescend to employ your humble agency. The progress of piety and the diffusion of truth have hitherto proceeded from the least to the greatest; and we have no reason to believe that God intends to invert an order of things which, while it lays the pride of man in the dust, displays his might, and secures his glory. As the arm of a peasant may possess more power, and may do more execution in the day of danger, than that of a Prince, so your prayerful and unostentatious efforts may surpass in real utility the splendid donations of Royalty itself. Methodism is a system eminently fitted to benefit the poor, both in their temporal and eternal interest; and it has hitherto been mainly supported and carried on by the poor. Rest assured, whatever our adversaries may say to the contrary, we love you in the Lord; we set a high value on your cordial co-operation; we greatly rejoice in witnessing your deepening piety and consistent conduct; and, without designing any invidious distinction, we say, with some degree of speciality, "Ye are our glory and joy." See then that you bear us and our work up in the arms of faith and prayer. Pray that our commission may be renewed; that our eye may be single; that our weapons, being spiritual, may be "mighty to the pulling down of strong holds;" that the Lord of hosts may fight for us; and that he would "create upon every

dwelling-place of" our "Zion, and upon all" our assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night;" and may be to us, in all our borders, for a "glory" and a "defence."

To such of you as are not united with us in church fellowship, and cannot unite, because of a difference of opinion on certain doctrinal or disciplinary points, I would say, we respect your prejudices; we call for no compromise of principles; we venerate the rights of private judgment; we hail you as brethren in the Lord; and we exhort you to hold fast what you conceive to be truth; and to strengthen the hands of your respective Ministers by cordially co-operating with them in their plans of usefulness. But with all this, we claim your prayers, and your “God speed." If we have agreed to differ on minor points, let us also agree to pray for mutual prosperity, for the establishment and extension of essential truth,-and that the "beauty of the Lord" may invest the church universal with such a degree of power, of purity, of unity, and of usefulness, as shall make her again "the joy of the whole earth." "None of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself." Posterity must of necessity be either the better or the worse for having followed us in the career of existence. It is God's plan to "visit the iniquities of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generations of them that hate him;" while he "showeth mercy unto thousands of them that love him, and keep his commandments." The consideration is both startling and encouraging; and ought to inspire us, on the one hand, with a jealous dread lest, by neglecting or marring the work of God, we transmit to our posterity an entail of wrathful and blighting consequences, enough to make them curse our memories, and rue their descent from such degenerate parents; and, on the other hand, it ought to stimulate us to pray, to labour, and to live, after such a style of holy devotedness, of disinterested benevolence, and of prayerful dependence on the Author of all good, as shall bring down his blessing on our contemporaries, and on our children's children to a thousand generations. "Let thy work appear unto thy servants, and thy glory unto their children. And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands establish thou it." Amen and amen!

RELIGION AND KNOWLEDGE.

THE fire of a glowing imagination may make folly look pleasing, and lend a beauty to objects which have none inherent in them just as the sun-beams may paint a cloud, and diversify it with beautiful stains of light, however dark, unsubstantial, and empty in itself. But nothing can shine with undiminished lustre but religion and knowledge, which are essentially and intrinsically bright. Nothing can be long entertaining, but what is in some measure beneficial; because nothing else will bear a calm and sedate review.-Seed.

MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATIONS.

THE WESLEYAN METHODIST. (No. LXV.)
METHODISM IN SHEFFIELD.

To the Editor of the Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine.

NINETY-TWO years have passed away since Mr. Wesley first visited Sheffield; and here, as in some other places, his way had been prepared, and he found a few ready to receive him. In London, Bristol, and St. Ives, he was gladly received by the expiring societies of Dr. Woodward. In Wales, Howell Harris had made ready a people prepared for the Lord. In Birstal, and the neighbouring villages, John Nelsonwho, after having assisted to build the palaces of the great, was called to the nobler employment of building the temple of God-had laid the foundation of societies which continue to this day. And in Sheffield, David Taylor had preached the Gospel, and converted sinners from the error of their way, four years before Mr. Wesley entered into this field of his labour. The character of those who were chosen by the great Head of the church to revive the decaying spirit of religion in Sheffield, and the adjoining districts, was of no common kind.

David Taylor, John Bennett, and John Nelson, to whose labours and sufferings Sheffield is greatly indebted, were not ordinary men. They were persons of strong sense, undaunted courage, and unshaken resolution; animated by a piety which was simple, sincere, elevated, and energetic. Having tasted that the Lord is gracious, they felt an intense desire that others should be partakers of the same heavenly gift.

David Taylor's first sermon was preached in Heeley, a small village near Sheffield. Here a few persons were converted to God, and formed, after Mr. Wesley visited Sheffield and organized his system, a part of the first Methodist society. It was in the year 1738 that David Taylor began to preach the Gospel. Four years after, Mr. Wesley visited Shef. field, and there preached for the first

time those truths by which thousands have been introduced into the joy of their Lord. "Monday, June 14th, 1742," says he, "having a great desire to see David Taylor, whom God had made an instrument of good to many souls, I rode to Sheffield; but not finding him, I was minded to go forward immediately however, the importunity of the people constrained me to stay, and preach both in the evening, and in the morning. Tuesday, the 15th, he came. I found he had occasionally exhorted multitudes of people in various parts; but after that he had taken no thought about them; so that the greater part were fallen asleep again." For these sheep which David Taylor had followed into the wilderness, Mr. Wesley provided a fold and a pasture.

In 1741 was built in Sheffield the first place of worship that was there occupied by the followers of Mr. Wesley. It stood in Cheney-square, and was built partly by private subscription, and partly by the liberality of Mr. Edward Bennett, a sugarbaker. Three years after its erection this house was pulled down by a mob. Almost immediately after the demolition of the first chapel, a second was reared by the zeal and liberality of a people every where spoken against. This building stood in Pinstone-lane, near the site of the first; and tradition reports, that, with a view to beguile the mob, and prevent them from destroying it, even before it was completed, it was built with chimneys, and in the form of a dwelling-house. But this expedient failed to preserve it for any length of time. On the 9th of February, 1746, it was totally destroyed. Thus, in the course of about four years, two places of worship were entirely demolished by the popular tumult. On these occasions, the mob and the magistracy acted in concert. One