ANECDOTES AND SELECTIONS.

pel of Christ; there is nothing else that ever did, or ever will, awaken man to a just and realising sense of the dignity of his own nature, and of the responsibilities under which he lives. To assure him, as the gospel comes on very purpose to do, that poor and miserable though he be, the occupant, perchance, of some wretched hovel hardly fit to be the shelter of a beast-a being no more accounted of by his fellows than the mire they tread beneath their feet to assure such a man that the Son of God came down from heaven to seek after him, and deemed the saving of his soul a sufficient reason for shedding his own infinitely precious blood-to assure him of this, and to get him to believe it, is to make him another man. It is to establish between him and that which is best and highest in the universe a link of lasting sympathy. The man begins to feel that he may venture to stand erect, and to look his fellows in the face, when he comes to know that he is an object of interest to the God of heaven. It is a new view of things that has broken in upon his mind. As his eye now lights on the filth and squalor that surround him, the thought arises in his breast, Why am I here? there is surely something better for me than this! the rags he wears, and the swinish husks he has been wont to eat, content him no longer. He will arise and go to his Father!

A SPECIMEN OF ITS POWER.-Eighteen months ago, was living in the interior of a close in Street. He was a shoe maker, and a good workman, and had some lads who wrought with him at his trade. He frequented no church, and was often drunk, His house was filthy in the extreme, and all but utterly destitute of furniture; the lads slept on the floor. His wife was ragged and miserable; his children ill-fed and worse clothed; three of them died in swift succession. The missionary's first visit to the family was on the occasion when one of them was to be buried. The father, when he came to ask his attendance, was so drunk that he could hardly deliver his own message. The missionary's visits were repeated while the other two children were dying; and the father all the while was seldom sober enough to be spoken to. The scene was one of unmingled wretchedness and misery-sickening to look upon. But the missionary persevered, and the Son of Peace came to that house; and now what a change! Everything that Lord Palmerston's heart seems to be set upon has been long ago secured, and a great deal more besides. The filth is gone; the lads no longer sleep on the floor; the house is decently furnished, clean and comfortable; the family prosperous; the father and mother are members of a mission church, and the drunken shoemaker is now one of the most zealous sanitary reformers in the district where he lives, giving his neighbours no rest till the nuisances of the place are removed.

ANECDOTES AND SELECTIONS.

THE INFLUENCE OF THE LOVE-SPIRIT.-Christians and christian ministers are to live in an atmosphere of love. I recollect an anecdote of a very good old man who has gone to his reward. A young man who was accustomed to come to him for advice, had received some ill-treatment at the hand of a professed christian brother, and he sat down and wrote a letter of remonstrance. He meant to make it sharp enough to cut, but he meant also to preserve a christian spirit. When he had prepared the letter to his satisfaction, he read it to his friend, and asked him if he thought it was not about right. The old man told him he believed it contained nothing untrue. "But the spirit of it," said the young man, "does it breathe a christian spirit?" "Well, as to that," replied the old man, "you, perhaps, are able to tell better than I. What you need to be sure of is, that every expression was dictated by the spirit of love. Perhaps you had better keep it a day or two, and then go over it carefully, and strike out such passages as you are not sure were dictated by a spirit of love." The young man did so, and cancelled the whole letter and wrote another, which the old gentleman advised him to send. The effect of it was to call forth a humble confession from the person to whom it was addressed.

RUDE WIT VIOLATES LOVE.-There is a way in which some christians violate the law of love in speaking, which ought to be noticed. It is sometimes not regarded as a sin, because it passes under the name of wit. Persons possessed of the power of making witty observations are very apt to be sarcastic, and thus to wound the feelings of those with whom they have intercourse. Because they have no malice aforethought, they often do not suspect they are doing wrong.

THE PREACHER AND THE PUBLICAN.-In a small town in Hampshire, there is living the pastor of a dissenting congregation who has been much persecuted. Some persons spread abroad scandalous and false reports concerning him, to injure his character as much as possible in the eyes of the world. In the same town there lived a man who kept a beer-shop, where a party of infidels assembled in the evening, who to shew their contempt of the bible, tore leaves from it to light their pipes. The reports concerning the minister were often the subject of their conversation. These reports were so many, and of such a base character, that one evening the landlord of the house, who was a professed infidel, said, "I really do not believe they are true; if they are, I am sure such a man will not be allowed to stand in the pulpit. I am resolved to go and hear him, that I may be enabled to form my own opinion concerning him.' He went, and when coming out of the chapel he said, I dont know what is the matter with me; I never felt so strange in all my life before. I am downright wretched." "What about?" was the reply. "Because something that man has said has

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taken such a hold upon me that I cannot get rid of it. I am sure he is not such a man as many have represented, or anything he could have said would not have taken such a hold upon me; however, I shall go again to hear him." The next sabbath he went to the chapel again, and his wife with him; the word came with power, and both were brought under its saving influence. The change wrought was soon visible; the man gave up the beer shop, abandoned his companions and their amusements, and has since worked at the trade of shoemaking to obtain a livelihood for his family. The minister was delighted and much encouraged at witnessing such a proof of the power of the gospel. The man and his wife not long since were publicly baptized and received into the church, and their four children attend the sabbath school. The man has joined the bible class, and the family are constant in their attendance on the means of grace during the week as well as on the sabbath-day. This once professed infidel having obtained the pardon of his sins, peace and joy in believing, and the love of God being shed abroad in his heart, he is now a happy man, for "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."

A FRIENDLY QUESTION.-Will you permit one who has your best interests at heart to say a few words to you on a subject which immediately concerns you? We are both travellers to ETERNITY; and to each of us it will be one of endless bliss or woe! You and I, my friend, have only one short life to live here, and if, at its termination, we should discover that it has been all along one grand mistake, O how sad a discovery! Life gone, gone for ever, never to be recalled! How unspeakably important, then, that we should choose a right course for ourselves; one that will cause no regrets at last, but that will approve itself to the better principles of our nature when the solemn realities of eternity are about to burst upon our view. It is under the influence of these feelings, and as your friend and brother, that I would ask you to sit down and ask yourself calmly and quietly this one question,-" Shall I go to heaven when I die ?" If you cannot answer it to your own satisfaction depend upon it there is something wrong. But dont stop. Go on to get to know the worst of yourself, and when you have, then go to the Saviour just as you are, for he will in no wise cast you out.

HENRY, PRINCE OF WALES, son of James I., once the darling and hope of the country, was one day hunting. A butcher's dog seized the stag, and killed it, and put a stop to the sport. Some of the company endeavoured to excite his anger against the owner of the dog, and told him that his father would, on such an occasion, have sworn so that nobody could have borne it. But the young prince meekly replied, "All the pleasure in the world is not worth an oath."

THE FIRESIDE. THE PENNY POST BOX.

The Fireside.

THE CHANGE FOR THE BETTER.

BY A WORKING-MAN.

YES: he was once a stupid sot, as many knew too well;
With staggering steps he stumbled on-but all I will not tell;
For one day he was brought to stop, and think upon his fate,
And round he turned another way before it was too late.

Now she, who once had battled hard with want and dreadful fears,
Rejoices that before her eyes a brighter dawn appears;
And now she blesses the good day her husband quite gave up
The place and thing he loved so once-the ale-house and its cup.
His children once were barely clad, no shoes upon their feet;
From day to day they wildly ran uncared for through the street;
But since their father saved the price of many a drowsy pot,
Well clothed and fed, to school they're led-how changed is their lot.
The household things, which once I'm told, were only old and few,
Have disappeared, and in their place are many nice and new;
The walls are now with pictures hung that once were black and bare,
And the inside of the cupboard, too, betokens better fare.

The tongue that once would curse and swear, when oft it knew not why,
Is now employed to speak kind words-Oh! what a change, thought I;
That gospel, too, he once did scorn, is now his chief delight,
And the sad ways he once so loved are hateful in his sight.

Both in the man and in his house a mighty change is seen,
And he himself is happy now, and his wife, too, is I ween;
And so are all the children, too; and now I think its plain,
That he who drops the drunkard's cup a happy home will gain.
Birmingham.

The Penny Post Box.

R. C.

ON HELPING SUCH AS WOULD HELP THEMSELVES. THIS terrible war has brought its old plagues along with it - want of work, low wages, and high-priced food. Some of us said it would when it began; but few believed us. We said it would because we knew that it always had, and always must. Well, here we are in the midst of it, with a cold winter all round us, shivering young and old. Those who are very poor must either submit to go into the poor house-I do not call it bastile, for that is all nonsense-or else they must starve and shiver on the stinted allowance of out-door

THE PENNY POST BOX.

relief. But even this out-door relief many cannot get; and I fear that this winter many a honest and willing-to-work couple have been put to it sadly to keep off their parishes, by selling some of the clothing and furniture that they had, after many years labour and pinching, got together. But it seems that many of them would rather sacrifice these than submit to wear a pauper's badge. I honour them for the spirit of independence which such conduct displays; but I think it is a burning shame in a country like our's, that our legislators, who are all rich men, do not make that stiff rigid poor law bend a bit in very hard times like these, that it might help such, either by loan on security given, or in some other way, so that the honest poor should not be compelled to part with one thing after another until they have nothing left. Indeed, that stiff law, by being so rigid, creates the very evil it pretends to restrain. It compels a man to part with all he has before he can have help; and what is he then, with his wife and children, to do, but become paupers altogether. That man will be disheartened, and he will have very little spirit left to try to set up house again. He would be a great benefactor to honest hard-working men, who would sit down and draw out some reasonable and well-digested plan by which such people could be helped just when they need a little assistance to prevent selling their goods, and save them from going to the parish. I should like to see this done somehow; and I think, Mr. Pioneer, if you would invite some of the men, with hard hands and clear heads, who understand the matter, to send their thoughts about it to your Penny Post Box, you would render good service to many of the families in which your pages are read. Let us show these men that we care for their bodies as well as their souls. Our Saviour did so, and I think we ought. However, I have said a few things to begin with, and I shall be glad to hear what others think about it. am an old working-man myself; and though, thank God, I have as much as I want, yet I often feel sorry for those who have not. Mind, I have not said a word about the idle scamps who wont work, or the swinish sots who spend all they get in pouring muddy beer down their throats till they make fools of themselves-I am not pleading for them-if they will not work neither should they eat ; and if they will swig till they are silly, why who can help it. I would leave the one till hunger made him work, and the other without the means of making himself worse than a hog-but I am pleading for men, women, and children, who are willing to work, and make the best of what they get. Such, I think, deserve our sympathy and help. THREESCORE.

I

[We shall be very glad to receive some letters from working-men and working-women on this subject. We know it is a very difficult question to deal with. What is wanted is some plan that should avoid imposition, and more efficiently aid the needy and helpless.]