ing the memorial of other early testimonies, in the interesting biography of the very young believers who have been made to glorify the Lord. He has read them with doubting mind, often tempted to think them exaggerated statements; and yet his heart desired the same for his own child, with intenseness of fervour, and considering the proneness to doubt the reality of other instances, it must be considered a remarkable operation on his own mind and heart, that he should have been led to supplicate for that which he had almost discredited in others. The lesson to himself he declares to be humbling, whilst it fills him with overpowering gratitude to the Author and Giver of all good. He is not one who did not know the work of the Spirit, for he had experienced it himself on his own heart, and in his life; but it was the doubt whether it were possible that such infantile minds could receive and display the operation of God upon their hearts. The mistake lays in a misconception of the nature of the work, which it is in the Lord's power to perform and perfect for Himself, needing not the maturity of the natural faculties of the bodily power as materials for Him. The soul is distinct from the body and has its own spiritual power, which we cannot doubt may be expanded beyond the growth of its mortal companion, the body.

It is, however, evident that this dear infant had not only had the benefit of its parents' prayers, before and after its birth, but had had a daily exhibition of their worship of the Lord, in Spirit and in truth. So that it possessed the two-fold blessing of prayer and example, thus affording another proof of the influence which the scenes and habits constantly

presented before the observation of infancy, will have upon the character as it is forming.

My prayer is, that this interesting instance, faithfully recorded, without any desire to go beyond the simple fact of reality, may be, by the Lord's blessing, made an instrument to awaken the tender interests of parental duty, under similar circumstances; that when their children are born into the world, they shall enter it as children of many prayers, and as those who have been asked of the Lord, and received as a loan from him. This indeed would be an earnest of a better generation, who should be acquainted with their Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier, in the days of their youth, and who should walk through this world, as they who were passing to, and looking for, a glorious inheritance in the kingdom of the Lord, and therefore should sojourn as strangers and pilgrims in this world, having their conversation in heaven.

Annie's grave is purposely placed where the parents necessarily pass it, when going to and from church; not to indulge that false sensibility which would dwell on their loss, and excite lamentation, but that they may be reminded of God's goodness and power, and be kept in a recollected frame of humility and thankfulness they brood not over the mortal dust, but have great consolation in thinking of the immortal spirit, and in the blessed hope of a joyful resurrection unto life eternal.

Review of Books.

NARRATIVE of Six Month's Residence in a Convent. By Rebecca Theresa Reed. Gallie, Glasgow. Price 1s. 6d.

We would not for a great deal, have missed falling in with this little book, which has done most excellent service in the United States, where, to the credit of Brother Jonathan's hereditary Protestantism be it spoken, twenty-three thousand copies were sold within a month. Such was the subsequent demand, that the publishers were obliged to keep power presses constantly at work, so as to issue, by the help of forty binders, from ten to thirteen hundred copies per day. We speak from our inmost heart when we say, that we wish its circulation in these islands might exceed that of the American editions.

It is impossible to conceive of a narrative written with more unstudied simplicity, or bearing a more evident impress of unadorned fact on its pages. The young lady was entrapped, when a mere child, clandestinely, to receive the blinding doctrines of Popery ; and to enter a convent under the specious character of boarder to deceive her Protestant family. She relates, in the most unadorned, unimpassioned manner, the daily routine of this sanctuary; and a few of the events which tended to open her eyes to the folly of her choice-the wretchedness of her hopeless lot.

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There is not a single line in the book, bearing upon the anti-christian character of this religion; it merely exhibits the practical working of that frightful system of spiritual and bodily thraldom, exercised over the inmates of a convent. In mere interest, the story exceeds that of the most highly-wrought novel; in point of usefulness, it outweighs all that imagination ever produced in the prolific subject of nuns and nunneries. We seem to become personally acquainted with those worthy personages, the Superior and her friend the Bishop, the latter of whom Miss Reed, without ever aiming at a description, has brought before us most vividly; insomuch that we should like to hear something more of his lordship; particularly since the very unequivocal manifestation of popular feeling to which he has very recently been subjected. There is a personage mentioned in the course of this little tale, over whom it is hardly possible not to shed tears of compassionate yet indignant grief-the poor oppressed Irish sister, Mary Magdalene. Miss Reed became a convert from Popery, much as she had become perverted to it with very little reference to its spiritual errors: its practical iniquities undoing the work which its assumed holiness, and deceptive blandishments had effected. She made her escape quite after the fashion, of a regular heroine, and returned to her friends, to whom she had written many unanswered letters, simply believing that they were actually sent-a point on which even we could have enlightened her from our own experience of the sort of epistolary faith kept with heretics-while her sister, seeking, with many tears, an interview with the poor secluded creature, was also induced to believe that Mary,

Agnes declined the meeting for which her soul longed.

The Narrative is quite a small volume, as the price may testify; and we seriously urge our friends to read it forthwith. In the meanwhile, to any parents who may be tempted to acquiesce in that most awfully perilous and cruel custom of entrusting children, or young people, to the nursing care of Popish seminaries, we faithfully give the assurance that this little book has placed it in a light calculated to convince the most obstinately blind person among them, and we demand their attention to its evidence, before they venture to seal, as far as in them lies, the temporal and spiritual doom of those committed to their charge.

Should any of our younger readers have formed delightful visions of the calm repose to be enjoyed in the meditative retreats of a cloister, we commend it no less heartily to them; giving them, by the way, two out of a detectable set of rules, inviolably to be observed, by some of that happy sisterhood. They are extracted from the Rules and Penances of our holy father St. Augustine, together with those of St. Ursula. The eighth is- To walk with pebbles in our shoes, or walk kneeling until a wound is produced. Never to touch any thing without permission.' The ninth - Never to gratify our curiosity, or exercise our thoughts on any subject, without our spiritual director's knowledge and advice. Never to desire food or water between portions.' And a part of the eleventh is,- Never to smile, except at recreation.'

Alas for the victims of papal Rome! Her ways are not the ways of pleasantness, nor are her paths peace.