mical career. It is lamentable that the means which are necessary to be used, in order to the ultimate attainment of a laudable object, should thus, by the weakness or corruption of our nature, be perverted to the purposes of evil. Piety and learning, like prayer and diligence, should go hand in hand; the one reflects lustre on the other: though, to the student who forgets the end in the means, it may be necessary to add, that the one so far outshines the other, that the Apostle Paul was content to forego all the advantages which he had attained at the feet of Gamaliel, and to count all things as loss, for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus his Lord.

Not only in proportion as the Christian student withdraws from the influence of the world, and lives near to God in private, will his own soul prosper or decline; and bis future usefulness, to a considerable extent, take its measure from the right or wrong use, he makes of his academical advantages literary and spiritual; but his conduct is important also to those around him: for the eyes of his companions and contemporaries are upon him, and he is responsible for his example, not only as far as regards himself, but as respects them also. When a student for the sacred ministry reflects upon his future designation as a servant of the Most High, to whom will be committed the care of immortal

souls, how incumbent is it upon him to ask himself; "Am I walking consistently with my sacred profession, as a Christian man, a Christian student, and an intended candidate for the Christian ministry? Am I humble, gentle, and forgiving? Am I diligent and studious? Am 1 pure and temperate in my habits; devotional in my spirit; and in all things endeavouring to adorn the doctrine of God my Saviour?"?

I have suggested these few cur. sory hints, for those whom they may concern to improve upon at their leisure. There is one part of the subject in particular, which I could wish to see treated more at length by some person equal to the discussion; I mean, the duty of religious students conscientiously devoting their minds to the peculiar studies of their college and university. Those who are much acquainted with either of our universities, and especially Cambridge, will feel the great importance of this topic;-a topic well worthy the pens of those whose piety, talents, and experience on the sub. ject, entitle them to guide the minds of the religious part of the public, and especially of the rising race of academical students. Should any person, thus qualified, see fit to take up this suggestion, he would confer a favour on many of your readers, and promote the cause of sound learning and religion.

E. M.

REMARKS DURING A JOURNEY THROUGH NORTH AMERICA.

(Continued from p. 418.)

Philadelphia, Oct. 1819. As I am now resting a little after my wanderings, I am anxious to take

the earliest opportunity of complying with your wishes, and of giving you the impressions I have received of the American character in the course of my route. I might indeed have done this at an earlier period, but it would have been with less satisfaction to myself.

Indeed, I have occasionally been led to doubt whether I have viewed the subject with impartiality, either while receiving the kind attentions which I have so generally met with, or when exposed to the inconveniencies incident to travelling in the unsettled parts of the country. I have sometimes been ashamed to find how much my opinions were influenced for the moment by humour or circumstances, and how necessary it was to guard against forming ideas of a particular town from the reception which I might happen to meet with, or the circle into which I might accidentally fall. I shall in future have little confidence in any general conclusions respecting a country, founded on the experience of a single traveller; since, however candid may be his representations, they must necessarily be drawn from a range of observation comparatively limited; and be tinctured, at least in some degree, with his own mental peculiarities.

Having thus prepared you to receive my statements with caution, I will give you my impressions without reserve.-If, in opposition to their republican principles, we divide the Americans into classes, the first class will comprehend what are termed theRevolutionary Heroes, who hold a sort of patent of nobility, undisputed by the bitterest enemies to aristocracy. Their numbers, indeed, are few, but they have too many peculiar features to be embraced in the description of any other class of their countrymen. Many of them were educated in England; and even those who never travelled had generally the advantage of the best English society, either colonial or military. They were formed in the English school; were embued with English associations; and, however active they were in resisting the encroachments of the mother country, they are, many of them at least, delighted to trace their descent to English families of rank, and to boast of the pure

English blood which flows in their veins.

In the families of these patricians, in which I have spent many agreeable hours, I met with nothing to remind me that I was not in the society of that class of our welleducated country gentlemen, who occasionally visit the metropolis, and mingle in fashionable or political life. The old gentlemen of this class are indeed gentlemen of the old school; and the young ladies are particularly agreeable, refined, accomplished, intelligent, and well-bred.

The second class may include the leading political characters of the present day, the more eminent lawyers, the well-educated merchants and agriculturists, and the most respectable of the novi homines of every profession. It will thus comprise the mass of the good society of America; the first class, which comprehends the best, being very limited, sui generis, and about to expire with the present generation. The manners of this second class are less polished than those of the corresponding class in England, and their education is neither so regular nor so classical; but their intellects are as actively exercised, and their information at least as general, although less scientific and profound. The young ladies of this class are lively, modest, and unreserved; easy in their manners, and rather gay and social in their dispositions : at the same time, they are very observant of the rules of female propriety; and if they ever displease, it is rather from indifference than from either bashfulness or effrontery. Their appearance is generally genteel and agreeable; their figures are almost universally good; and they dress remarkably well-in this city, indeed, more to my taste than in almost any place I recollect: for which they are indebted partly to the short passages from Europe, which waft across the Atlantic the, latest fashions from London and Paris; partly to their accommo¬

dating tariff, which places within their reach the beautiful Canton crapes, and all the most elegant -materials for dress which American enterprize can collect in the four quarters of the globe; and partly to the simplicity of the Quaker costume, which has had a happy and sensible influence on the taste and habits of the community at Jarge. Their tone of voice, which is generally a little shrill, and their mode of pronouncing a few particular words, are the peculi arities of manner which I think would be most remarked upon in the best society in England. Ge nerally speaking, also, the style of female education in America is less favourable to solid acquire ments than with us. The young Jadies here go earlier into society than in England, and enter sooner into married life: they have not, therefore, the same opportunities for maturing their taste, expanding their intellect, and acquiring a rich store of well-arranged and digested knowledge, as those have who devote to improvement the longer in terval which climate or custom has with us interposed between the nursery and the drawing-room. In the highest class, especially in Carolina, there are many exceptions to this general remark; and among the young ladies of Boston there appeared to me to be, if less refinement than in the Carolinians, yet a very agreeable union of domestic habits and literary taste, and great kindness and simplicity of manners.

The third class may comprehend all below the second; for, in a country where some would perhaps resent even the idea of a second class, this division is sufficiently minute. This class then will include the largest proportion of the American population; and it is distinguished from the corresponding classes of my countrymen (the little farmers, innkeepers, shopkeepers, clerks, mechanics, servants, and labourers) by greater acuteness and intelligence, more regular-habits of readCHRIST, OBSERV. No. 248.

w

ing, a wider range of ideas, and a greater freedom from prejudices, provincialism, and vulgarity. It is distinguished, also, by greater coldmess of munner ; and this is the first of the charges against the nation generally, on which I shall remark.

As respects the highest classes, I think this charge is in a great measure unfounded; their reception of a stranger, at least, appearing to me as frank and as warm as in England. To that part of the population which I have included in the third class, the charge attaches with strict propriety, and in many cases their coldness amounts to the English "cut direct." At first it incommoded me excessively, especially in the women in the country, who shewed it the most; and I have sometimes been disposed to ride.on, not in the best temper, when, arriving at an inn, after a long stage before breakfast, and asking very civilly "Can we have breakfast here?" I have received a shrill "I reckon so," from a cold female figure, that went on with its employments, without deigning to look at us, or to put any thing in motion to verify its reckoning. In due time, however, the bread was baked, the chicken killed, and both made their appearance, with their constant companions, even in the wildest part of America, hàm, eggs, and coffee. The automaton then took its place; and if I had been an automaton also, the charm would have remained unbroken; but I do not remember an instance in which the figure did not converse with good humour before 1 rose. Very often, however, our reception was warm and friendly; and the wife or daughter who poured out my coffee was frank, well-bred, obliging, and conversible. coldness of the men, also, I soon found to be confined principally to their manner, and to indicate no indisposition to be sociable and accommodating. On the contrary, in a route of more than 7000 miles, of which I travelled nearly 2000 on 3 R

The

horseback, and the rest in steamboats and stages, I have found the various classes as accommodating and obliging as in England; some times, I confess, I have thought more so. Some parts of Georgia and the Carolinas might suggest a slight qualification of this remark; while East Tennessee, and the valley of the Shenandoah, might almost claim a warmer eulogium. In the course of my route, I have met with only one instance of personal rudeness, and that too slight to be mentioned, except for the sake of literal accuracy. My servant's impressions correspond with mine. On ques tioning him, at the termination of our route, he said he thought "the Americans quite as ready to serve us and one another as the English;" and that they were continually expressing their surprise to find Englishmen so civil. Now our civility was nothing more than would naturally be suggested by a recollection of the institutions of the country through which we were travelling, and a general desire to be pleased with friendly intentions however manifested. The coldness of manner of the Americans, how ever, is a great defect, and must prejudice travellers till they understand it a little.

With regard to the vanity which is charged upon them: this foible is admitted by all their sensible men, who are disgusted with the extravagant pretensions maintained in inflated language in their public prints. I have heard some of them jocosely say, that they expect their countrymen will soon begin to assert that they are not only the most powerful and the most learned, but the oldest nation in the world.

In good society, however, I have seldom witnessed this vanity in any remarkable degree, and I really think I have seen more of it in the Americans I have met with in England, than in the whole range of my observation since I landed in this country. When I have made the concessions to which I thought

the Americans fairly entitled, I have not often observed a disposition to push their claims too far, but, on the contrary, a readiness to suggest some point of comparison in which Great Britain has obviously the advantage. And, without attempting to defend an acknowledged defect in their character, I must confess the Americans have some excuse for their vanity. Descended (which of us will dispute it?) from most illustrious ancestors, possessing a territory perhaps unequalled in extent and value, victorious in the infancy of their bistory in a struggle for their inde pendence, and rising with unprecedented rapidity in the scale of nations, they must be more than mortal if they were not elated with their condition; and if sometimes they may appear to draw too heavily on the future, and to regard Ames rica rather as what she is to be, than what she is, I must own that I never yet met with an American who carried his views of her future greatness so far as I should be disposed to do if she were my country, and if I could be satisfied of the predominating influence of religious principle in her publie councils.

As for the inquisitiveness of the Americans, I do not think it has been at all exaggerated. They certainly are, as they profess to be, a very inquiring people; and if we may sometimes be disposed to dispute the claims of their love of knowing to the character of a liberal curiosity, we must at least admit that they make a most liberal use of every means in their power to gratify it. I have seldom, however, bad any difficulty in repressing their home questions, if I wished it, and without offending them; but I more frequently amused myself by putting them on the rack; civilly, and apparently unconsciously, eluding their inquiries for a time, and then awakening their gratitude by such a discovery of myself as I might choose to make. Sometimes a man