to do to all as I wish they should do to me." We feel sure that many of you made promises like this, and doubt not that, were your affectionate parents to give us their opinion, they would tell us with pleasure, that you not only made the resolution, but kept it. And we well know something else; that no boy or girl ever kept such a promise and regretted it afterwards; for you know that you are happiest when you strive to forget yourselves and your own pleasure, and try most to increase that of others. Perhaps many of you may have wondered how this is, and why you should feel so peaceful and happy when trying to make others happy: It is because then you are obeying the Lord Jesus Christ, from whom all happiness comes; and though He loves you so intensely, and desires ever to make you blessed, He can only do so when you are obedient to Him. He has made one law -a law for angels as well as men, that to be happy we must be good; and He is ever careful that when we are good we shall be happy. Whenever the feeling of selfishness rises in your minds, and you think only of yourselves, you draw yourselves away from the Lord Jesus Christ; you turn your back upon Him, and immediately some of those spirits who are always miserable, hasten to you to make you as unhappy as they are themselves. But so soon as you resolve to banish all selfish

ness, and strive to overcome it, you turn again towards the Lord; and the happy angels can approach you; those good and affectionate angels whose constant effort is to make you as good as themselves, that you may be prepared to dwell with them and be as happy as they are.

We hope some of these thoughts crossed your minds when you rose from your beds this morning, and that you did not forget, as you knelt by your bedside, not only to thank your Heavenly Father for permitting you to see a New Year, but to ask His aid to assist you to spend it properly, and so to lead you that you may be wiser and better at its end than you are now. We come to you with a prayer that we may help you in this work, and earnestly as we desire your happiness will we endeavour to provide you with a Magazine, and strive that it shall contain information that shall be of use to you. All we have now to ask of you is, that you will carefully read it, believing that all it contains is written for your good; and if sometimes you are tempted to carelessness, to forgetfulness of that heavenly law, love one another, then think of this Number; look back to the last mile stone of your existence, to this day, and remembering your early morning prayer and your resolution, seek the assistance of your Heavenly Father, and He will enable you to banish all

feelings of selfishness, if you strive well as: boys and girls; and when grown up as men: and women, He will at last enable you to become like Himself, and fit you for His blessed kingdom in heaven.

EDITOR.

THE NEW YEAR.

(BY THE LATE REV. T. GOYDER.)

FOUNTAIN of Life! Eternal source of good!
Thou Spring of purity and truth divine!
Whose love supplies both man and child with food-
On Thee for ever let our souls recline.

In quick succession days and years pass by,
But slowly we the path of wisdom tread,
O give us strength each youthful sin to fly,
And feed our trusting souls with living bread.
The circling year has just perform'd its round,
Yet we thy richest mercies ever prove:
O may we still in virtue's paths be found,
Progressing onwards to the realms above.

While time, with rapid wing, pursues its way,
May we Thy great and sacred name revere;

Then shall we hail with joy the rising day,

That brings the New-the welcome dawning Year.

[D. T. D.]

"WE shall not love our own household less, because we love others more.

In the beauti

tiful words of Frederika Bremer,-"The human heart is like heaven; the more angels the more room.'"-Mrs. Child.

THE CATECHISM OF CHARITY.

INTRODUCTION.

FATHER! said a youth of fifteen, who had been carefully trained in the holy ways of practical piety, I hear very much said by members of the New Church about Charity; but when I go amongst our religious friends of the Old Church, I seldom hear Charity even mentioned, but I hear much said about faith; piety also, is frequently spoken of as the greatest of all virtues. Now it seems to me very remarkable, that our New Church friends should talk so much about Charity, and so seldom mention faith or piety, while our other religious friends do just the contrary. I think that circumstance must surely point to some marked difference between our religion and theirs. Is it not so?

Father. I think, my son, your supposition is well founded. The New Church friends not only assent to the saying of the apostle Paul, that the greatest of all the Christian graces is Charity, but the preference they give to it in their conversation shews, that they act upon the apostle's saying in their practice, by cultivating that heavenly quality chiefly, which they believe it to be their highest glory and privilege to cultivate.

Son. But should they not equally cultivate faith and piety?

Father. Certainly they should do so, and the disinclination they shew to speak of these important and inestimable Christian graces, almost suggests to me some ground of alarm lest they should be too much neglected. I fear that their experience of the liability of others to speak of faith and piety in a wrong, or at least in an imperfect sense, has given them a disinclination to speak of them at all, even in a right sense.

Son. Why, I thought that every one knows what faith and piety are, and that every one must think of them and speak of them in the same way. Now, I know our friend Mr. G, who professes, you know, what are called evangelical sentiments, means by faith, what he believes to be the doctrines of the New Testament; and by piety he means the practice of prayer in public and in private, according to his faith.

Father. Your remark is creditable to your discernment. But, my son, we of the New Church who rightly appreciate faith and piety, do not take quite so superficial a view of the meaning of the terms faith and piety. By faith we do not mean the belief of the true doctrine merely, but we mean also a firm trust in that adorable Lord whom the doctrine reveals to us, and a confidence that He will certainly do for us all that which He has promised, in all those relations in which He.