conversion of an immortal soul.

Indeed, I have heard you complain yourself, that the preacher who comes to shuns, rather than seeks your conversation. Now this must arise not from an unwillingness to meet your arguments, but from ignorance of the real state of your mind.

A word spoken in season, how good it is! How mighty may be the influence of one precious truth on the mind, even where it seemed to fall to the ground! A pilgrim once entered our house after nightfall, and took his seat by the fire. He seemed to have been a man of finished education, judging from his accent and pronunciation. But he had been

"Crazed with care or crossed with hopeles love."

During the evening, he repeatedly uttered with great solemnity the following sentence:-"Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish."— Luke xiii. 3.

The oracular words sank deep in my mind; and to the force of that one statement, authenticated by the chapter and verse, I attribute much of those troubles of conscience which haunted me so long, and issued at length in my conversion. Various are the ways in which the truth may find its way to the heart; and to the inattentive or the forgetful, those glimmerings of light that

THE WALDENSES.

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sometimes arise in the mind where religious instruction had not been enjoyed, may seem to spring from the collision of the natural powers of the soul, but they are in reality sparks of revealed truth that had remained lodged unobserved in the understanding; like the seeds of the forest tree borne by migratory birds to a distant land, where the plants which they produce may be regarded as the spontaneous production of the soil.

The Waldenses became itinerant dealers, that they might have an opportunity of disseminating the Scripture truths which they had committed to memory, in places to which they could not otherwise gain access. I wish we had more of their zeal and their prudence; and that we were habitually disposed to husband better the facilities we enjoy for advancing the kingdom of God in the world.

This gentleman urged principally the absurdity of praying to saints, which, as a nominal member of the Church of Rome, I thought it my duty to defend as well as I could. 1 was struck with the view in which he exhibited the question, and the consequences which he deduced logically from the Roman doctrine. He said it led directly to Polytheism, and his conclusion I felt it impossible to set aside. But I shall have a more favourable opportunity

of referring to that hereafter. I shall now go on with my narrative.

Mr. N proposed, at parting, that I should call again in a few days, and requested that I would take the loan of a Bible, that I might, in the mean time, consult the passages he had brought forward in the course of the argument. He was so kind, and seemed to feel so warm an interest in my case, that I could not well refuse; but I took the book with very great reluctance. I became so uneasy, as I passed along the road, that I was tempted to return and give it back to the owner. But this would have been a proof of weakness, such as I did not like to avow. Were the book my own property, I would certainly have thrown it over the hedge, and thus got rid of the disagreeable burden. But I had only received the loan of it, and I was bound in honour to return it safe, and I was also expected to give my opinion of some of its contents. Never did I feel so perplexed. It was a thick volume, and made so great a bulk in my pocket as almost necessarily to attract observation. And were a Protestant Bible discovered in my possession, I knew it would bring an infamy on my character that would be indelible. However, I resolved to conceal my dangerous companion as carefully as possible.

A DANGEROUS COMPANION.

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1 succeeded for a day. I was sitting with my friend, the schoolmaster, in the summer-house, to which we were accustomed in fine weather to retire, to pursue our own studies after school hours, as I had engaged to teach him French in exchange for his Latin. The declining sun darted down his golden beams through the openings of the green canopy above us, and illuminated the

gilt edges of my Bible, a corner of which was conspicuous in my pocket. We were at that moment warmly disputing about the grammatical construction of a particular passage, when his eye was suddenly arrested by the corner of the Bible! He was silent-blushed-looked at my face, then at the Bible, and then at my face again.

"What is that in your pocket?" he inquired, with a look that spoke surprise and anger.

"The question," I replied "is one that I might be excused from answering; but I have no hesitation in avowing that it is a Bible," and so saying, I handed it to him.

"Where did you get this," said he, glancing at the title page.

“ Mr. N.

persuaded me to take it. I was very unwilling to do so, but as he promised to take so many copies of the poem, I thought it hard to refuse, and so brought it with me merely

to please him.

But were it otherwise," said I, "may I ask, why I am not at liberty to read what book I please?"

66

Oh, of course," said he drily; "but in taking that book from such a man, you countenance the calumny that Catholics have no Bibles themselves."

"That is a fact, and not a calumny, so far as we and our neighbours are concerned; for I do not know a single person that has one, with the exception of Mr. P—————, who seems to keep his two folio volumes, with their notes and comments, more for ornament than use."

"Use!" said he, with a sneer, "I hope you are not among the number of those who deem the Bible a useful book. I hope there are few in the nineteenth century that entertain such an obsolete notion, at least, beyond those little coteries that fatten on the property of the public."

Still, my dear Friend, it seems not quite just to pass such a sweeping censure on the Bible without examining it. It might turn out after all not so worthless or so pernicious a book as we are willing to think. We are condemning it, you know, unheard; and that is unjust as regards the Bible, and foolish as regards ourselves. What if this book should be found to