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scepticism and hardened infidelity of those who would not be subjugated to the yoke of any religion, it very soon assumed a complete ascendancy over the mass of the rural population, and over the great majority of the females of all the gradations of society.

The priesthood, having thus gained the ear of those numerous and, in some respects, influential classes of the community, have not been backward to avail themselves of the various advantages it has afforded them. Without adverting, for the moment, to that mixture of good which unquestionably attends their labours, they never fail to turn their ascendancy to the account of more firmly rivetting the chains of superstition-of closing every avenue against the access of pure and unadulterated truth, and of fomenting a spirit of the most bigotted and rancorous hostility, against a dynasty and a system of government, which they consider to be at variance with the paramount interests of their own ecclesiastical dominion. It is altogether a mistake to suppose that Popery, because it is stripped of its ancient insignia of secular authority, and has been forced to retire from the throne, the camp, the legislative chamber, and the institute of science, is extinct or powerless in France. Though it has been chased, amid the horrors of intestine conflict, by a still more reckless, heartless, and sanguinary rival, from the high places of wealth, and dignity, and command, yet, like Marius, amidst the marshes of Minturnæ, it still keeps its head above water, and from those thick fastnesses of ignorance and superstition, over which it holds sway, only awaits the opportunity of putting forth a vigorous effort for the re-establishment of its

pristine supremacy. It is true that it exhibits every symptom of having reached its grand climactericthat it has arrived at the era of its decrepitude, and that it will not be very long before it will fall prostrate, like Dagon, before the ark of the covenant; not, indeed, by the hand of human violence, but by a more efficacious and resistless energy, issuing from the throne of the Eternal. In the meantime, it is working incalculable mischief through the whole length, but more especially at both extremes of the social scale. It cherishes all the pride, and bigotry, and morbid disaffection of the noble-it blinds the understanding, in the same proportion as it ferments the passions of the peasant; while it affords a plausible excuse to the scoffer and the infidel, to reject the claims of the gospel, in that grotesque and fantastic play of mimic phantasmagoria, by which it intercepts, from the eyes of the people, the beams of eternal truth.'

Introduction, page 15.

TO THE EDITOR of the cHRISTIAN
LADY'S MAGAZINE.

MADAM,

I AM most unwilling to tread the dangerous path of controversy, but trust I shall not be entering this fearful track, if I venture to submit a few remarks, in reply to a communication which appeared in your Magazine for May, on the subject of female attire. Were I silent on this occasion, it might seem as though I had intended to convey a condemnation, which your correspondent conceives to have been implied by me: 'that Ladies wearing earrings were not christians.' Indeed I had not the most distant idea of pronouncing such an uncharitable accusation, though I should very much rejoice if no christian wore these appendages. Is not Eta rather paradoxical in her observations: a vain and ridiculous christian seem to me contradictory terms. I think, too, she will find it difficult to prove the assertion that 'good women, in past ages, did wear earrings,' although she conceives several passages of scripture establish the fact. I am unacquainted with the parts to which she refers, and the one given is incorrectly quoted. In Gen. xxiv. the word earring occurs in the singular number only, and the marginal translation is, an ornament for the forehead -quite a distinct thing from the earrings which the

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writer I alluded to considers, beyond a doubt, to have been objects of idolatrous worship. Your correspondent has, I think, mistaken the purport of the letter on which she comments. It was not intended to point out as a remedy for vanity, a change of the quality or mode of habiliment," but rather to draw the attention of those who have been divinely taught to the necessity and efficacy of prayer as the only means of subjugating this deep-rooted enemy, to the importance of avoiding all appearance of an evil they deprecate, and to endeavour to show how sadly expediency, with its endless train of deceitful compromises, had succeeded in casting a veil over our understandings, so that we can scarcely discern with unobscured vision the decided injunctions of Holy writ.

I do most fully agree with the view, that, the inner man once made pure, all other things would, or at least should, occupy their proper places, as an essential consequence, and that this internal cleansing must be our first great object: but on the other hand, I am aware that some excellent persons unconsciously retain habits which their fellow-Christians deem unsuited to their high and holy calling, and which, not unfrequently, act as stumbling-blocks in the way of weaker members of Christ's flock, and lead even worldly persons to remark their inconsistencies. Should not, therefore, every appearance of evil be most carefully avoided? Must we not be ready to enter into the spirit of St. Paul's inspired example? Rom. xiv. 21.

Surely Eta would not delay the repression of any exterior display of vanity, until conviction of its sinfulness in each individual instance, would in

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sure its destruction! Would not the operation of such a principle give the death-blow to every effort which we are bound to use for the benefit of mankind? Does the command, to train up a child in the way he should go, imply that the excellence of that way is to be understood and appreciated by the infantine mind before it is undertaken? Rather may not the word train be considered to express the powerlessness of the object to be guided, as well as its inability to comprehend the whys and wherefores of the system pursued for its welfare.

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I hope Eta will pardon these remarks, which I have truly desired to make in the spirit of love and meekness. I doubt not we agree fundamentally, and notwithstanding minor differences of opinion, we can unite in longing for that glorious period when we shall know even as we are known.' Perhaps, dear madam, you would kindly favour your readers with your opinion on the subject under consideration. I trust I am willing to receive any conviction of error on my side, and gratefully to acknowledge its effect.

Yours, &c.

IOTA.

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