bands at home." She exclaimed with vivacity, "You would not, surely, drive us back to that?" 66 Driving!" retorted Mr. Witherspray, to whom this query was addressed, "driving, my dear good lady, is altogether out of the question; the grace and benefit of spiritual guidance depending wholly and solely on its voluntary character. We neither drive you, as you say, to this, nor desire to dictate as to the nature and amount of your disclosures; nevertheless, you will do well to come. Woe for the heart that craves not human sympathy with its highest and nighest concerns! Woe for the heart that scorns to open its griefs to the divinely appointed pastor, (and heavily, alas! shall the woe recoil on him, if he be not found ready and able to help!) Who but he can at once command leisure, skill, experience, patience, to attend to your complaints, rectify your scruples, dissipate your doubts, direct your goings; meet, in short, all your spiritual exigencies? There is no longer cause to fear, heaven be praised for it! lest the most secret and precious cords of the human affections should be drawn forth, only to be knotted into scourges for your sides, and manacles for your wrists. Your deference to such advice, once the subjugation of the slave, is now, or it should be, the loving subjection of the son." The speaker's colour rose higher and higher; so did his voice. All at once he seemed to become aware of the unwonted excitement, and made a sudden pause. Habitually placid and selfpossessed, he sometimes is apt to be thus carried away, when apprehending any disparagement to His beloved Church; as the steadiest of walkers may be taken off his legs by a tornado. All this while, strange to say, my brother has not spoken a word: he seemed infinitely diverted at seeing his silent wife thus hitched into a controversy, and continued to watch her countenance with loving archness. Mr. Witherspray smiled also, and, directing her attention to the opposite group of young ones, asked if she supposed "the rogues would show all that amount of ivory," (for the boys were in a broad smile on this sudden appeal to themselves,) "or whether she thought they would love her, as it was plain to see they did, if she had required of them, on pain of displeasure and punishment, that they should tell her every inadvertent fault, record to her every foolish thought of those that will come and go through the best-intentioned mind?" The querist, receiving no other answer than a sweet acquiescent smile, went on: "We must be sure the result of such arbitrary dealings would be only cowardice and subtilty, with abject obedience. No, no, we want no bulls, do we, boys? to make us go to mamma in all our troubles. Whom else should we turn out our hearts to, can you tell, if it be not to our wise and indulgent mother?" The boys looked graver, and answered the appeal by a shy loving glance at mamma, who for her part seemed to feel the aptness of the illustration, though she continued silent. "When you and that talkative wife of mine have done," said my brother, "and I can get in a word edgewise, I was going to observe, touching this same ghostly assistance which our Church offers to her children, that it is salutary, among other things, for the correction of certain overstrained scruples, fantastic figments, which neither help toward, nor are any symptom of, Christian soundness. You will find people ready enough to bring their gnats for dissection, at least I do, while they are content to leave their camels quietly grazing at home." Mr. Witherspray here smiled, as from some sudden recolleclection. "I had once," he said, "a parishioner of this character, but he, good old man! had no camels at home; in him this tenaciousness of conscience was, I truly believe, the genuine fruit of devout, humble love. He came to me once-come, now," cried he, turning to the rest of us, "I will give you a guess apiece. What was it that made my excellent old friend call me down two pair of stairs, when I was pressingly busy? We will begin with little Willie." But Willie's bolt was not ready; though he greatly approved the turn the conversation had taken, as he continued to testify by rubbing his small hands between his knees, and laughing rapturously on each fresh guess. George was next applied to, and having lately won the honorary medal for spouting the facetious tale of "The Pilgrim," wondered “whether the capital old fellow hadn't taken the liberty to boil his peas before putting them into his 'sandal-spoon.' دو Samuel, for his part, surmised that "perhaps he kept an ass, and, like another old man' we have all heard of, might think whether it was not his duty to mount the creature upon his own shoulders." Other guesses were made, more remarkable for the mirth they called forth, than for the niceness of their application; when the good-humoured propounder, turning to the eldest girl, said, "Come, Miss Gertrude, you mustn't think to be let off: tell us, as your pretty ballad says, "Of what was the old man thinking?" Poor dear Gertrude, whose nice fault is extreme shyness, sent an imploring look round the circle; but meeting only encouraging glances, ventured to reply, that " perhaps the old man had failed to restore the bag to the horse's nose.' Upon which the rest of the young ones fell into such an ecstacy of laughter, that it was some time before she was able to explain the meaning of her quaint surmise. She told us, addressing the boys, that Mr. Cecil, whose "Life and Remains" she had lately read, had, once on a time, returned home after a day of heavy duty, quite harassed and worn down; but on suddenly calling to mind that many miles back he had observed a team standing before an alehouse door, the front and hind horses of which had each a bag of oats hanging at his nose, while that of the intermediate horse had fallen to the ground out of reach of the poor animal, he had made it a question of conscience whether he ought not to remount his horse, and ride back to relieve this four-footed Tantaius from his painful predicament; all the more cruel, that he could hear his companions munching with entire satisfaction before and behind him. After the boys, agreeably to their instinct, had testified their delight at this unpleasant dilemma of an unfortunate quadruped, my brother declared he would have his guess also, and, with a playful menace at his meek partner, said he supposed that the poor fellow having, like himself, "a shrew of a wife, had neglected to keep her in proper order." "Or, what if he spoilt her with kindness?" was the pithy and graceful retort. "No such thing; no wife in the case. If there had been," replied Mr. Witherspray, "he would scarcely have brought his troubles to a tough, stubborn, old bachelor for redress. Well, do you all give in? It was that he felt too young for his years,'-that, at an age,' he said, 'when he ought by rights to be going on crutches, he found himself able to walk stoutly, without the help of a stick and that that very morning--this was the rub-he had even caught himself running.' "The ready laugh" again greeted "the circling jest ;" but as soon as it had somewhat subsided, a person, or, to speak more accurately, a voice-(for the speaker had so edged away out of observation, as to be hardly visible)-related another anecdote, in point, in that hurrisome spasmodic way in which a shy person tells a story, wishing all the while he had never begun it. If I had not already gossiped more than enough, I might be setting my younger readers a guessing in their turn, who the bashful member of our circle could be?-an old acquaintance of theirs, too. But I dare not detain them a minute longer. Even now I have in my mind's ears the merry gibe of some young rogue of a reader, exclaiming, "Hollo! call you this Aunt Nelly's history? I call it Aunt Mary's." There is no denying the charge; but if you, my dear young critic, only knew the delight it is to me to be in any manner associated with that beloved being-in fact you do know it, if you are so happy as to possess an Aunt Nelly of your own, and if not-you must pardon me for saying it, you are no judge at all of the matter, and your opinion is not worth a button.* *The last anecdote is genuine and true to the letter. † S. Luke xxxii. 40-43. Collect for Easter Eve. And with Him dwell continually.* What joy like this to give? Thus may the joyous spring-tide E'en with its fasts, no day of gloom Winchester, REPENTANCE. (A Homily suited to Lent, translated from S. Ephrem.) I. To Thee I pray, O LORD! Since Thou art good, I knock at Thy doors; to all Thy promise is given, "Knock and I will open." The doors are not barred and closed, therefore may the sinner come and knock; for they are ever open to the just and the unjust. Thou hast pointed out Thy doors to the sinner, that he may call and knock, and gain admission. Thy love challenges us to pray to Thee, and impels us to solicit Thy aid. Behold, I have asked, as Thou hast taught me; give to me, LORD, as Thou hast promised: behold I have knocked as Thou hast commanded, open unto me, O LORD, as Thou hast engaged. I ask not gold, O LORD, for it is the mammon of iniquity, nay, iniquity itself; nor yet wealth and possessions, for such like can by no means purchase life. Better is pardon than gold, and remission of sins than wealth; and poverty unpolluted by sin than riches and possessions. Willingly would the rich man have given all his gold in exchange for the crown of poverty of that beggar Lazarus. When man dies, he carries nothing away with him, as it is written. Doubtless he would freely give up all his wealth for a drop of water. One of two things doth a man carry with him through the gate of the grave, either works of righteousness, or deeds of wickedness. I have learnt from the foolish and wise virgins in what manner I should make ready, that Thou mayest then open Thy doors; if indeed they who enjoyed the honour of virginity were not received when oil failed, who will then give any of his to me, a sinner? Those foolish virgins, and that rich man who communed with himself, afford us an example that we must first sue for grace before righteousness is attained. When medicine, the healing of the hidden ulcers of iniquities, is at hand, the physician who is treating the wounds of sins acts perversely if he keep back the medicinal ungent from the sores, until justice unexpectedly closes the great gates of mercy. II. I have hopes of salvation, because, when a deadly ulcer is gathering, penitency destroys it; and its stains, foul and loathsome * Collect for Ascension Day. |