aid. The eleventh essay is on the subdirision of parishes, as requisite for more efficient pastoral care, and for Church accommodation. The author pleads for Church extension and for Parliamentary grants. In the twelfth essay the author advocates Parliamentary interference, and presses that interference with regard to the subjects of poor laws, education, currency, and the revenue. In the thirteenth he addresses the ministers of the crown on their responsibility to God as advisers of the Sovereign, in appointments to public offices, in revenue matters, in foreign policy, in protecting the oppressed, and, above all, in regard to Church patronage. The thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth essays are addressed to the bishops, to the clergy, to magistrates, and to the legal and medical profession, on the duties they have to perform, and the responsibilities which rest on them. The seventeenth essay is on female influence, so mighty for good and for evil. And the concluding essay represents how much of the national evils which provoke the Divine vengeance, are still untold of, in the foregoing recapitulation of the perils of the nation; and then deplores the want of repression of public crimes, the fearful amount of blasphemy which will one day rise up against us, and the deplorable state of the places of public resort for amusement, and of our theatres. There is so much in this book calculated to instruct, improve, and admonish, that we regret it is written in a Whiggish style, and sometimes in the language of a partisan, rather than of a Christian critic. The author will do well carefully to revise the whole work for the next edition, at which we have little doubt it will soon arrive.

The Life of William Wilberforce. By his Sons, Robert Isaac Wilberforce, M.A., Archdeacon of the East Riding, and Samuel Wilberforce, M.A., Archdeacon of Surrey. New edition, abridged. London: Seeley, Burnside, and Seeley.

THE honoured name of Wilberforce has connected with it, whether we regard it as politicians, moralists, philanthropists, or Christians, so many associations of a deeply interesting character, that we look at every new or revived memorial of his career with fresh interest, and renewed delight. Sometimes we meditate on him as the fearless assertor of true conservatism; at other times, as the uncompro mising defender of public morals; now, as the emancipator of the slave; then, as the opponent of revolution. To his "Practical Christianity" we turn as to a book of wisdom; and to his private life as a model for a Christian Church layman. With his name are connected the spread of the Gospel, the extension of missionary efforts, the establishment of Christianity in India, and all the other mighty marvels of the march of true religion in the world. At one time we are sighing with him over repeated defeats in the antislavery cause, whilst at others we are rejoicing with him at its advances, if not its splendid successes.

With the public life of this truly great man, most of our readers,

if not all, are acquainted. With his private life and his closing days, they, like ourselves, are undoubtedly less familiar, and we propose, therefore, to confine our extracts and remarks to this portion of his being.

With the death of his second daughter we shall commence our remarks: "Blessed be God (he said, during her illness), we have every reason to be thankful for the state of mind we witness in her; a holy, calm, humble, reliance on her Saviour, enables her to enter the dark valley with Christian hope, leaning as it were on her Redeemer's arm, and supported and cheered by the blessed promises of his Gospel. We are in the hands of our heavenly Father, and I am sure no one has had such reason as myself to say that goodness and mercy have followed me all my days."

"Now was seen the fruit," i.e., when this object of his tenderest love was taken from him (observe his biographers), " of the high degree in which he had learned to walk by faith rather than by sight. I have often heard (he says) that sailors on a voyage will drink friends astern, till they are half way over, then friends ahead. With me it has been friends ahead this long time.' It was not (add his sons) by the slow process of reasoning that he learned to regard this as a short separation, he at once felt that they should not long be parted; and he soon describes himself as enjoying as much peace and social comfort as any one ought to expect in this stormy world.'"

He thus describes his feelings when Lord Brougham, then Chancellor, placed at his disposal the living of East Farleigh, and to which his second son was appointed. In a letter to a friend, he says, "You will join me, I am sure, in being thankful as well as rejoiced in my being able to inform you, that Lord Brougham has given to my second son (or rather, I may say, to me), quite spontaneously and very handsomely, the living of East Farleigh. The parsonage is very little above a mile distant from Barham Court, and there must be many pleasant circumstances in being so near the residence, library, park, &c., of an old friend, of such dimensions. This event comes in such a way as strongly to confirm the persuasion that it is an indication of the favour of God; and I cannot but recognize a providential hand in Lord Brougham's being prompted to make the appointment just when we were in want of such a settlement and residence, though he knew nothing of the matter, and was quite unconsciously the instrument of granting us our wish." This holy and blessed habit of referring all good to God, is worthy of special imitation. In our temporal as in our spiritual mercies we must desire to see the finger of our merciful and eternal Benefactor, and by so doing there will be added to us a new pleasure, and a new source of enjoyment, even the feeling that God is for us.

The latter years of the life of this good man were principally passed in the parsonage houses of his children. From one of these he wrote as follows:-" We have now been here for about six weeks. How can I but rejoice rather than lament at a pecuniary loss (alluding to the loss of the largest portion of his fortune), which

has produced such a result as that of bringing us to dwell under the roofs of our dear children, and witness their enjoyment of a large share of domestic comforts, and their conscientious discharge of the duties of the most important of all professions."

To another friend he wrote, "I thank God my health is in about its ordinary state; though I am becoming yearly more stiff and crazy. But what causes have I for gratitude! Surely no one ought more habitually to feel and adopt the psalmist's language, Goodness and mercy have followed me all my days.' And now have we not great cause for thankfulness in being moored in our latter days in the peaceful haven which we enjoy (after all my tossings during my long and stormy voyage in the sea of politics), under the roofs of our sons in Kent and in the Isle of Wight, relieved from all the worry of family cares, and witnessing the respectability, usefulness, and domestic happiness of those most dear to us? Had not the state of my finances rendered it absolutely necessary, however, I fear I should hardly have thought myself warranted in giving up my only residence; but it is really true, speaking unaffectedly, that our heavy loss has led to the solid and great increase of our enjoyments."

Thus it is that a Christian will view the losses and disappointments of life. He will see in all a Father's hand, and kiss a father's rod.

As he entered his seventy-third year he thus expressed the state of his feelings. "How little could I expect to complete my seventysecond year! Yet it is on this day completed, and I am suffering no pain, and my complaints are those which are salutary, without producing great bodily suffering, like the kind suggestions of a friend tenderly watching over me, and endeavouring to obtain for me the benefits, without my feeling the evils, commonly attendant on providential visitations.......O pray for me, my dear, that my return of gratitude and service may be more commensurate with the rich stock of blessings which the Almighty has poured out upon

me."

His overflowing gratitude to God was the chief feature of his later years. Everything became with him a cause for thanksgiving. When some of the infirmities of years began to press upon him, "What thanks do I owe to God (was his reflection), that my declining strength appears likely not to be attended with painful discases, but rather to lessen gradually and by moderate degrees! How good a friend God is to me! When I have any complaint it is always so mitigated and softened as to give me scarcely any pain. Praise the Lord, O my soul!"

Thus, from seeming or apparent evil, he was taught by the Spirit of God how to educe good, and thus spiritual strength was added to his other graces, and he was enabled to rejoice even in the fire of affliction.

The sweet humility of his mind was one of the distinguishing attributes of his character. He had the most profound aversion to all flattery. This beautiful simplicity (say his biographers), survived all the unfavourable influences of his life; and the old man,

whose name was a familiar word in every mouth, whose country parsonage was visited almost like a shrine, and who was told by Rammohun Roy, that when he left the East one of his chief wishes was to see Mr. Wilberforce, was still altogether lowly in his own sight, and could say with natural simplicity, when treated in a place of public concourse with some marks of courtesy, “How very civil they were to me; they made way for me, and treated me as if I were some great man!"

And so he was; but he knew it not, for his humility caused him to think lowly of himself, but highly of those who served with ardour and constancy his Divine Master. That humility, however, was too sincere and constant not to be perceived by others; and in the same degree he was respected and beloved.

As he drew nearer to the house appointed for all living," his spirit became increasingly attuned to the harmony and bliss of heaven. When he looked out upon the world from his retirement, it was in the faithful spirit of one, who, though not unacquainted with its storms, was more deeply learned in the secret of a quiet confidence in God. From all common business he at last withdrew as much as possible; and could not leave the quiet of his country retirement, even for the most friendly asylum, without his spirits failing him, and praying that, in proportion as he grew unfit for the bustle of life, he might become more and more harmonized with the sentiments and dispositions of a better world.

"And now the time was come (say his biographers) when his dust was to return to the earth, and his spirit to God who gave it. ......While all around him were full of thought about himself, his own anxiety was altogether for two of his daughters-in-law; for a month only before his removal, two grandsons were born to inherit the name of William Wilberforce."

"All his thoughts and conversations now savoured of the better world, to which he was drawing near. It had always been his feeling that the most fitting state for the last hours of life was one far alike from excitement and from terror; in which, while the mind was conscious of the awful nature of the approaching change, it could yet resign itself to its reconciled all-merciful Father, with the humility as well as the confidence of a child."

Generally speaking, during his last illness, there was hardly a word he uttered that was not a bursting forth of praise. When he experienced pain, he thanked God it was so little: when relieved by suitable remedies, he blessed his heavenly Father for such alleviation. "How ungrateful men are (he exclaimed), in not seeing the hand of God in all their comforts! I am sure it greatly adds to our enjoyment, to trace His hand in them."

To a friend, who called on him in the closing scene of life, he said that the text on which he was then most prone to dwell, and from which he was deriving peculiar comfort, was a passage in the epistle to the Philippians-" Be careful for nothing, but in every thing, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God; and the peace of God, which

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passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ." While his frail nature was shaking, and his mortal tabernacle seemed ready to be dissolved, this "peace of God" was his blessed and abundant portion. On another occasion he said, "With regard to myself, I have nothing whatsoever to urge but the poor These words publican's plea, God be merciful to me a sinner.'

were expressed with peculiar feeling and emphasis. To his son he said, "You must all join with me in praying that the short remainder of my life may be spent in gaining that spirituality of mind which will fit me for heaven."

It was altogether a striking combination of circumstances that he should have arrived at London to die, just at the period when the bill for the abolition of slavery was read for the second time in the House of Commons. "Thank God (said he), that I should have lived to witness a day in which England is willing to give twenty millions sterling for the abolition of slavery!" It was a merciful act of an ever merciful and gracious God thus to allow him to witness the consummation of this great, this wonderful act of humanity and benevolence.

At length the last sands in the hour-glass passed through, and he entered that world where pain and doubt are for ever at an end. But his closing days bore witness to the declaration of holy writ, that "the path of the just is like the shining light, which shineth more and more unto the perfect day."

A Believer's Manual; containing the points of a Christian's Experience, from the period of his Conversion to his arrival in Glory. By the Rev. James Marryat, B. A. London: Seeley, Burnside, and Seeley. 1843. One vol. 12mo., 196 pages.

It is very refreshing to the spirit, in the midst of all the contention, clamour, reproach, and disorder now prevalent, not merely in the world, but, alas! also in the Church-when works of a controver sial character, and often written in a bitter spirit, are pouring in upon you every hour-to meet with a sweet, calm, confidential friend by the way, like this "Believer's Manual.' Away you hasten from the waters of strife, from the jarrings of debates and discussions, from the unkind or suspicious language of party men and party writers, and you sit side by side on the banks of the celestial Jordan, and look beyond this world, to the heavenly and glorious Canaan in the skies. We wish, in a subsequent edition, the title-page may simply contain the words, " A Believer's Manual." We do not like those which follow, since each Christian's experience is so different to his fellow Christian, that although there are very many points of resemblance, there are so many more which are peculiar and individual, that it cannot with truth be affirmed that any book can contain "the points of a Christian's experience from the period of his conversion to his arrival in glory."

This little book is intended for the use of those who have reason to hope and believe that they have been born again-renewed in