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"Mr. E. was at last happily brought to a condition of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

"He has long been bedridden, and has to read through an enormous lens, fixed in a tube, which he has himself constructed, any ordinary glass being useless to his fading eyesight. He is also excessively deaf. Shouting to him for hours has made me sometimes quite hoarse; but there are so many pleasing circumstances connected with his case, his faith is now so simple, his penitence for past neglect of God our Saviour evidently so sincere, that it is a great pleasure to visit him notwithstanding, and to converse with him, and to hear him repeat the prayers he has selected and committed to his memory, which is very vigorous and retentive, notwithstanding his extreme age. I have every reason to believe he is among those blessed ones who 'worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh,' Phil. iii. 3."

Socinianism has its origin "in the pride and folly of unsanctified intellect." When our Lord Christ is formed in the heart, "the hope of glory," then all such deadly errors flee. Rejoicing in the beatific vision already given, the soul can then say :

"Answer thy mercy's whole design,

My God, incarnated for me :
My spirit make thy radiant shrine;
My light and full salvation be.

And through the shades of death unknown,
Conduct me to thy heavenly throne."

In concluding, we remark, that although the poor of London are not found to be led away to any considerable extent by the errors of Socinianism, their ignorance and irreligion render them nevertheless pitifully the prey to various forms of the wildest and most visionary emanations of perfect folly. We had proposed alluding to several of these forms of error, and giving some particulars of the Mormon delusion among others, and of interviews and discussions with Mormonites. Interesting, however, as such statements and narratives would doubtless prove, the limits of a single volume prevent their insertion, except to the exclusion of cases of more direct spiritual result, and consequent greater interest.

CHAPTER V.

INTEMPERANCE.

Drinking usages of society-Homer's Hector-The certain guide of the Gospel-Morbid alcoholic cravings-Prison preferred to liberty-The slavery of sin-An affecting result of investigation-Facilities for drunkenness on the district-Replication of sin-Formation of Total Abstinence Society on the district—A bricklayer's oration-Narrative of a returned transport-A hopefully converted coal-heaver -Cases of benefit from temperance-Narrow escape from suicide Extravagance and intemperance "Delirium tremens" - Testimony of the Earl of Shaftesbury-An explanation-American statistics-Drunkenness and want in old age-Pleasing narrative-Personal recollectionsSad excesses—A pleasing case of hopeful conversion—A personal observation-Joseph John Gurney.

THE drinking usages of society oppose an insuperable barrier to the moral and religious improvement of the labouring classes-and indeed, in proportion as they prevail, of all classes of society. These customs must be changed before we can possibly see the moral desert "rejoice and blossom as the rose."

Wisdom in all ages has deplored their existence.

Homer, with the feeble, uncertain, and erring ray of heathenism, thus alludes to the popular fallacy as inimical to great achievements :—

"Then with a plenteous draught refresh thy soul,
And draw new spirits from the generous bowl:
Spent as thou art with long laborious fight,
The brave defender of thy country's right."

The valiant Hector, however, is made by the poet to decline the inebriating cup :

"Far hence be Bacchus' gifts, (the chief rejoin'd,) Inflaming wine, pernicious to mankind,

Unnerves the limbs, and dulls the noble mind."*

We who have Christianity to guide us into all truth, and to show us things to come, know that the miseries of the unrepentant drunkard are not confined to this life. The word of God assures us, that "no drunkard can inherit the kingdom of God," 1 Cor. vi. 10.

Drunkenness is indeed morally a sin, but drunkenness is also physically a disease. A very large class of persons of drinking habits I have found not more to possess the power to drink

* Pope's Iliad, book vi., 320.

short of actual drunkenness, and there stop, than the waves of the sea have to quiet the winds that lash its surface into foam.

Total abstinence is the physical remedy in such cases, by which the uncontrollable morbid craving of the stomach for alcoholic stimulus ceases, and the stomach is weaned.

Conversing with a woman resident upon my district, a very violent character when intoxicated, who had only that morning been discharged from prison, to which she had been committed for an assault whilst intoxicated-she listened very respectfully and attentively to my exhortations, and wept in a very piteous manner, and said with great earnestness, she wished to God she was always in prison, as there she could not obtain "the drink."

She returned when she left prison, as she well knew, to a neighbourhood where invitation and temptation to intoxication would meet her at almost every step. It was affecting to hear a fellow-creature observe, that in prison she was comparatively happy! Yet such was doubtless the fact in her case, and is so in the cases of multitudes of similar intemperate characters.

Sin inflicts a worse slavery on the human heart

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