Mimpriss's School-Room and Initiatory Charts of our Lord's Life and Ministry.—Size, 5 feet 6 inches by 4 feet. A Series of Thirtyfour Tablet Lessons, Narrative, Practical, and Geographical, for the above Charts. The Gospel History, foolscap 8vo. (being the above Lessons in a volume.) London: Wertheim. Cheltenham Wight,

1838.

THESE publications, with the chart of the Acts of the Apostles on the same plan, form a complete and well-illustrated history of the introduction of the Gospel Dispensation, and are suitable for schools of every rank and denomination. The School-Room Chart is 5 feet 6 inches by 4 feet; and is in a sufficiently bold style of execution for all the pupils of a large school to study it simultaneously. A smaller chart is 30 inches by 24 inches, and is in every respect suitable for limited schools and families. No Sunday, National, Boarding, or other School, ought to be without these charts, to illustrate the historical and geographical portions of the Evangelists; they serve to fix each event of the Saviour's life and ministry in the mind of the pupil, and to localise each in the order of its occurrence. It is not now a question whether they are useful auxiliaries in the work of instruction; experience sufficiently attests their worth. Maps, charts, diagrams, pictures, are almost indispensable in the absence of the objects which they are to represent, and they save much verbal expla

nation.

It is, perhaps, desirable that we should explain the nature and use of the Charts before us. Their publication was urged upon Mr. Mimpriss by those who had experienced the utility of his more expensive charts, and who wished to see the same scheme carried out so as to be afforded at a low price. The present School-Room Chart is produced at one-fourth of the cost of the Pictorial Chart of Mr. Mimpriss. This chart contains one hundred numbers, each of which has reference to some remarkable event in the life of the Saviour; and the number is placed upon the spot where the transaction of which it is the representative took place. Thus No. 1 is placed at Jeru. salem, and refers to the announcement of John the Baptist's birth to Zacharias; No.2, at Nazareth, and in the Hill Country, refers to the announcement of the Saviour's birth, and to the Virgin Mary's visit to Elizabeth; No. 3, at the Hill Country, refers to the birth of John; No. 4, at Bethlehem and Jerusa lem, refers to the birth of Christ, and his presentation in the Temple. An historical table, in the order of the numbers on the chart, contains references to the chapters and verses of the Evangelists where the events are recorded. Each separate period of our blessed Lord's ministry is pourtrayed

in a distinct colour, so that no confusion can arise in the minds of either teachers or learners. The chart also exhibits two introductory charts on a small scale, showing the main divisions of the country, and one or two of the chief cities-these are for beginners. These, and the full explanations for its use, sufficiently attest the care and pains that have been manifested to render it simple and acceptable to those who have been unaccustomed to the art and science of teaching.

The historical table has also thirty-four references to the lessons which accompany the chart. The tablet lessons are very simple, and accordant with Scripture; they may be confidently recommended to schools of mutual and simultaneous instruction; and the volume is highly worthy of introduction into every boarding-school in the land. No school ought to be without the valuable apparatus here provided by Mr. Mimpriss. We sincerely hope, that his exertions in the cause of Scriptural Education will be duly appreciated; and we congratulate the author, and the friends and promoters of Religious Education generally, that the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge have thought so highly of these charts, that they have honoured them with a place in their list. No stronger recommendation can be required.

The Vale of Probation. A Dream. By the REV. S. Hobson, L.L.B. London: Roake and Varty. 18mo. P. 186.

THIS little volume contains a fund of sound and valuable matter, conveyed in an interesting form. It is written with ability and great knowledge of mankind; and in language, and every other respect, is well adapted for general reading. Persons of the higher and more respectable classes would do well to circulate such works as this amongst those over whom they possess influence.

Recollections of a Country Pastor. London: Burns, Portman-street. 1839. 12mo. p. 184.

WE really know not when we have perused a book with more zest than these Recollections. The Country Pastor is an intelligent, pious, and sober man, who, endued with that wisdom which cometh from above, prefers and exalts genuine religion above every other cousideration. His Recollections consist of occurrences in which he bore a part, and the perusal of which cannot fail of making a lasting impression upon the mind. It is a charming book, and will be highly useful, if generally placed in the various religious lending libraries, for which it is well adapted,

TRADITION. The Quakers and Methodists set more store of Tradition than all other bodies of professing Christians put together. The former hold the Traditions of George Fox, their "father and founder;" and the latter hold the Traditions of John Wesley, their "father and founder." Both sects so much prefer their Traditions to the Word of God, that while they leave their Bibles at home, they carry their Traditions always about with them wherever they go. Their hats, and coats, and caps, and their dresses, generally, are all carefully shaped after the Traditions of their elders. And so highly are those Traditions reverenced, that you might as well expect to see a gay lady without her finery and trinkets, as a Quaker or a Methodist without his Traditions. "Full well do ye reject the Commandments of God, that ye may hold your own Traditions."-St. Mark vii. 9.

Two FACTS FOR CHRISTIANS.-There is not, in all the New Testament, a single instance of any person having preached without having been previously ordained; in other words, there is not the slightest sanction in the Word of God for lay preaching. This is fact the first. Fact the second is this, that there is not a single instance to be found in the New Testament of a believer or Christian who was not in outward and visible communion with the Christian brotherhood-the Church. The Lord added to the Church daily such as should be saved; that is, such as should be saved the Lord added to the Church-the means appointed by Him for salvation. Has he appointed any other means?

INVISIBLE CHURCH.-The idea that the Church of Christ is invisible, is so glaringly opposed to Scripture, and so manifestly absurd, that it would seem to have been started by the papists, for the very purpose of leading people by its extravagance and absurdity to see the visibility of the Church; insinuating, at the same time, the great falsehood that the Romish Church or sect is the visible Church. If the Church of Christ were invisible, we should never know whether or not we belonged to it; and we might as well hunt for a pin's head in a haystack, as to look for an invisible thing in this great and confused world.

danger the dissenting interest in the parish and neighbourhood; and they actually petitioned the Bishop not to remove the Curate. The Bishop, however, discharged his duty by suspending the Curate, whose conduct merited such a punishment. We are in the possession of the local and personal names connected with this fact- -a fact which by no means surprises us: nor will it surprise any one who has witnessed in the Liverpool dissenting and papistical journals, the sort of opposition which is carried on against the Church Building Fund in that town. Such

a fact as this, so clearly expository of the voluntary system," is worth a hundred arguments with many people.

THE VILLAGE CHURCH. Blessings on those old grey fabrics, that stand on many a hill, and in many a lowly hollow, all over this beloved country. I am of Sir Walter Scott's opinion, that no places are so congenial to the holy simplicity of Christian worship as they are. They have an air of antiquity about them-a shaded sanctity, and stand so venerably amid the most English scenes, and the tombs of generations of the dead, that we cannot enter them without having our imaginations and our hearts powerfully impressed with every feeling and thought that can make us love our country, and yet feel that it is not our abiding place.-Howitt's Rural Life in England.

THE BLASPHEMY OF POPERY.-It has been often asserted, with a degree of assurance, which Rome alone could venture to display, that attributes, which belong to God only, have never been applied to the Pope. "Out of thine own mouth we will condemn thee." Popish authorities shall be our proof that the contrary is the fact. "All the names which are given in the Scriptures to Christ, whence it appears that he is superior to the Church, all these same names are given to the Pope."-Bellarm. de Auct. Conc., lib. 2, c. 17. "Thou art the shepherd, thou art the physician, thou art the ruler, thou art the cultivator, finally, thou art another God upon earth."-Marcellus, in his address to Pope Julius II. 66 We have expected thee, O most blessed Leo, as the Saviour that was to come."-Begnius, speaking of Leo X. "Although the sight of your divine majesty does not a little terrify me, who am beginning to speak.* Not ignorant that all power both in heaven and earth is given to you only by the Lord."-Ant. Pucci before Leo. "Snatch up the two-edged sword of the divine power, which is given to thee, and order, command, and decree, that an universal peace and alliance take place among Christians for the space of ten years at least, and bind the Kings to it in the fetters of the

X.

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greatness of the great King, and bind the nobles to it in the iron manacles of thy censures, since all power is given to thee in heaven and earth."-Stephen, Archbishop of Patras, 1815, addressed to Leo X. "Rome was great under Cæsar, but now she is greatest, Alexander VI. reigns; the former was a man, the latter is a God."-Corio, Storia di Milano, par. 7, p. 888. "It may very evidently be shown, that the Pope, who, as we have already related, was called God by Prince Constantine, can neither be bound nor released by the secular authorities, for it is manifest that God cannot be judged by men.' - Pope Nicholas in his letter to the Emperor Michael. Instances might be multiplied without end, wherein the Pope of Rome is addressed as God, or assumes the title and powers of Deity. The Church of Rome glories in the motto, semper eadem, and therefore we may fairly conclude, that, according to the rules of unchangeableness, his holiness possesses the same claim to divine attributes in the nineteenth century, which he enjoyed in the sixteenth century. Pride is enumerated by the Church of Rome among the seven deadly sins. What is all that but pride, and we may also add-blasphemy!— Dublin Warder.

SIGNS OF THE TIMES.-The following facts, (which we record on unimpeachable authority,) of the spread of Popery, are worthy of the most serious consideration. A detachment of seven Priests were last year sent from Maynooth, and located in Australia, and it is said seven more are now on their passage for that district. At the end of last year a Romish Bishop and Priests arrived at Čeylon from Columbo, for the conversion of that colony. A similar detachment has been sent to the Cape of Good Hope. Whilst for the West India Islands, previously under the care of one Bishop, no less than three have been recently appointed. These facts of the spread of Popish influence in our Colonies, are strongly corroborated by a similar move

ment almost in every part of England. With regard to our own immediate locality, we can speak with accuracy. Besides the additional Chapels opened by the Papists in this County, (which we some time since reported and commented on,) a more than ordinary energy is at this moment going on in every one of them. In some an additional Priest has been added to the Staff. In others an exchange has taken place, substituting a more efficient or a more dignified Minister in the room of the old one; and in all there has been an extension of the machinery for making converts, requiring additional pecuniary resources, which it is quite certain could not be afforded by the members of their community here. We do not pretend to explain from what secret funds these supplies have been furnished.-Dorset Chronicle.

LORD STANLEY AND THE CHURCH.-At the meeting at Warrington in January last, in behalf of the Diocesan Education Society, Lord Stanley, in an eloquent speech, made use of the following simile: "I reverence the constitution of the Church, which, proceeding from the Bishops downwards to the inferior Clergy, imitates the order of nature. The sap of the tree springs up from the root, flows through the trunk, spreads from the trunk to the branches, from the branches to the smaller boughs, and onwards from them till it penetrates the remotest fibre. This is the analogy of the Church; for it also is the wise dispensation of Providence that, although the leaf of the tree receives nourishment through the trunk and branches, yet, by an almost miraculous dispensation, it gives back that which it receives, returning its grateful nourishment to the boughs and to the trunk in compensation for the grateful nourishment which it has derived from them. (Applause.) There cannot be a closer analogy than between this beautiful dispensation of nature and the Church of which we are members.