Address to the Wesleyans; Woodhouse's Care- || APRIL-Robert and Frederick; Fairchild Fa- MAY-Barr's Architecture; Cards for Distribu- JUNE-Poole on Church Architecture; Wat- 167. AUGUST-Road to Ruin; Classified Spelling- SEPTEMBER-Milner's Christian Mother; Wil- berforce's Letter to the Gentry, Yeomen, &c. of Yorkshire; Liturgia Domestica; Catechism of Roman Idolatry; Letters on Infant Schools; Abdiel, a Tale of the Early Christians; Ivo and Verena; Sintram and his Companions; Jesse's Day at Hampton Court; Cunningham's Hand- book to Westminster Abbey; Plain Words to Plain People; Engravings published by the Christian Knowledge Society; Chart of Natural OCTOBER-Chamberlain's Selected Letters; Manual for the Sick; Church Hymns for Con- xxii. 235. NOVEMBER-Modern Methodism a Schism; DECEMBER Life of Isaac Milles; Doane's Gospel after the Pentecostal Pattern; Mary AUGUST-The Lady's Well (Hawker); Mortal, SEPTEMBER-The Birth-day; Lines on the OCTOBER-Good counsel of Chaucer; the NOVEMBER-Lines written on a fine Autumn DECEMBER-Turn to the east (Bandinel); Song of the school (Hawker)-xxiv. 279. Poetry, the intent and use of, xiv. 32. Plague, the, at Eyam in 1666 (Miss Seward), xv. 50. I must confess, Avery, I have very great pleasure in doing so; and besides that, I like when I owe, or have promised, money, to take the very first opportunity of paying it; for such is the uncertainty of events, we may never live to pay it, if we keep putting it off from day to day; and then, again, deferring to pay, when money is really due, is frequently the cause of great inconvenience to those to whom we owe it, who are not able perhaps to pay those who work for them; and so it happens very often that the poor suffer through this "There you are right," said Avery; "and pay my tithe and all my other dues to the very day-for I consider it my bounden duty; but I do not feel half the satisfaction in pay- ing my tithe that I do in paying my baker's (6 Well," said Elford, "if you will listen to me, as we ride along, for I daresay you are going the same way, I will tell you why I have such pleasure in paying my tithe; though you will perhaps think that I speak rather too Avery agreed to give up a visit which he was going to make previous to the meeting at "You must know," said Elford, "that I was always what people call a particular sort of man in money-matters; not perhaps from any high principle, but because I did not think that any man ought to lose what was right- knew they were to be paid to the parson, and "Circumstances, however, occurred in the "Now although my rector could not legally "When the next tithe-day came round, I "Now, Elford," said Avery, "I do call that shabby; but that's just the way-one never gets any good by doing right: indeed, I think you did a great deal more than there was any "Do not say, Avery, that we get no good by doing right; for in that you contradict Scripture, which says, 'Take heed unto the thing that is right; for that shall bring a man peace at the last:' if not at once, yet at last,' you see. I thought then as you do now; but I have since often looked back upon my mo- tives and conduct, and been heartily ashamed of them; for I was then acting in the sight of "But do not suppose that nothing more was said on the subject of what I had done; B and high-principled dealing, and lauded me felt, completely disappointed in me; and he up to the skies. You may be sure I felt quite || said, nothing was so painful to a Christian pleased and puffed up, and thought him a heart, as to trust another with its good opiproper sort of gentleman; though I felt I nion, and then find the person not deserving should have liked him rather better, if he had of it. He had formed a good opinion of me; not taken the money." but when he saw what was in my heart, that my goodness and principle were in appearance only, and had no root in them, the good rector looked as if he could have wept-and I daresay he did when he got home-over the hollowness of one of the chief, and, as he thought, best of his flock. "Well, Elford, you did your duty, and a great deal more in my opinion, and deserved as much praise as he could bestow." "Not so, Avery; I only did my duty, and did it too from low and unworthy motives,at least there was a great mixture of bad in them, so that I did not reap the reward I had anticipated. I felt just at the time very well satisfied at being thought a right good honest sort of man, but I did not always feel so afterwards; for when Mr. Carter used to speak to me as to one who was willing to do right, and make sacrifices for the Church, and so forth, I felt in a way I can hardly describe; I felt that, if he could look into me, he would say, 'You are not the man I took you for.' Now this made me feel uncomfortable, at least sometimes; so that, although I had won his good opinion, I did not feel easy under it. "But my honesty and integrity, instead of getting me the praise of my fellow-parishioners, produced nothing of the kind, but rather the contrary. Well, Elford,' said one, 'I am glad you made good those deficiencies; I once did the same sort of thing, and thankful I am it was put into my heart to do so; for I could not have borne what the rector said just now, if I had not.' One or two others made similar remarks, regarding the thing as a matter of course with honest upright men. All this was very mortifying to me, who had been looking out for no small share of praise for what I had been doing. But this was not the worst: there were two brothers who, from that day, never ceased to persecute me with their raillery and jokes whenever we met together in company, calling me Mr. Integrity, the great tithe-payer. Though they had war in their hearts, yet the words in their mouths were so soft that I could never openly resent their behaviour; and that only nettled me the worse. "It was going home one day, after meeting them at market, and being a good deal annoyed by them, that I fell in with Mr. Carter. He was anxious, he said, to erect a school for the instruction of the children of the poor in the principles of the Church of England; and he felt sure, as I had already given such proof of my readiness to do what was right, that I would willingly assist him. Being in a very bad humour, after what had taken place at market, I told him, in a churlish, unchristian sort of way, that I thought || he could afford to do it out of his tithes. I saw he was very much struck with what I said, and the manner in which I said it; indeed, he told me afterwards that he was, and || "A few days after this, we had a long conversation about what had occurred; nor did I conceal from him what I knew and felt about my own motives and conduct. After making such remarks as he thought most likely to correct and amend what he had seen so amiss in me, he proceeded to point out in what light the payments, which I and others of his parishioners were yearly in the habit of making him, should be regarded. He took down from one of his shelves Sir H. Spelman's work, On the Respect due unto Churches, and read the following passage, which got my little nephew to copy out for me, and which I have in my pocket-book, and will now read to you. The law of nature teacheth us that God is to be honoured; and that the honour due unto him cannot be performed without ministers, nor the ministers attend their functions without maintenance. And therefore, seeing God is the supreme Lord and Possessor of all, and giveth all things unto us that we are maintained with, it is our duty, both in point of justice and gratuity, to render something back again unto him, acknowledging this his supremacy and bounty; as honouring him for his goodness; as a testimony of the worship, love, and service we owe him; and lastly, as a means whereby these duties and services may be performed to him. This, I say, the very law of nature teacheth us to do; and this the law of God requireth at our hands; but what the set portion of our goods should be, that thus we ought to render back again, I cannot say the law of nature hath determined that. But the wisdom of all the nations of the world, the practice of all ages, the example of the patriarchs Abraham and Jacob, the approbation and commandment of Almighty God himself, and the constant resolution of his Church, hath taught and prescribed unto us to render unto him the tenth part!' "He wished me to observe that tithes seem evidently a portion of the original law of God; for they are spoken of before the law of Moses was given, under the law, and under the gospel. He then shewed me how in this country, from the very earliest times, tithes had been paid, and that they came of the gifts of private individuals, who thought it both their duty and their happiness to honour God with their substance, dedicating it to him with the most "And here let me remark, Avery, on what you said about the greater pleasure in paying your baker's bill, you little thought what a low and degrading view you were taking of tithes. You see, according to your notions of them, that you would rather pay the man who provides perishable food for the bodies of yourself and family, than do your share in those payments which help to provide the bread of eternal life, not for your own family only, but for all those who are members of the universal Church of Christ. You see you almost placed the soul below the body in your estimation of things." "No, Elford, I do not intend to do that; but is not money paid to one man just the same as money paid to another?" - something more of their nature, and of my "I believe, Avery, that I am; and it is this view of tithes, and of one or two similar payments, viz. that they are God's dues, and that I pay them to God and not to man,--it is this view of the matter that makes me so anxious to pay them as soon as ever they are due, and gives me such satisfaction in paying them. I feel that God puts a great honour upon me by placing me in a situation in which I have to make payments to him. "You perhaps wondered, the other day, at the way in which I spoke of the compulsory commutation of tithes, and said that I thought it one of the wickedest acts this nation had been guilty of for a very long time. It was begun in covetousness, and because men hated this sort of payments, and did not at all see God in them: and what does it end in? Sacrilege-a robbery of God. For is not that a robbery of God, when the Church of God, instead of getting the actual value of the tithes, gets a fixed rent-charge on an average of some years past? Is not that robbery of God, when his Church is shut out of any benefit arising from improved cultivation ? Is not that a robbery of God, when waste lands are altogether left out, and though they may at some future time yield their fruits of increase and be thickly inhabited, yet no acknowledgment is to be given by them that God is the Lord of the whole earth? It is impossible, without sinning, to commute Christian duties; and I look upon the payment of tithes as a very great and important religious duty." "That is what I am speaking of, Avery: I say that tithe is not paid to man, but to God; most other payments are made to man. Look, for instance, at taxes, men sometimes call tithes taxes, but they are very wrong in doing so; and they only do so because they do not view them in the light in which they ought to be regarded. Look at the variety of taxes which we pay; these we pay to man, for temporal objects, for expenses incurred at home, abroad, by our army, our fleet, and in a thousand other ways. But look at tithes: they are God's portion of the earth, set apart for holy purposes, and given to his ministers. They are employed in furthering the concerns of a better country, i. e. an heavenly one, and spreading the blessed gospel, which we know is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth. Taxes have to do with time; tithes with eternity. This is the reason I look at tithe and rent in two such different lights. Tithe is paid to God; rent to man. For a similar reason it is that I have such pleasure in paying Church-rates, which some "We are not to look, Avery, at particular make such a grumbling about. I look upon instances, but to general results; and I would them as going to uphold the house of God, ask in return, If the clergy of this country, and so aiding in maintaining the worship of the ministers of Christ's holy apostolic Church, God, and keeping the Lord's day holy, with had not had a permanent provision, and that all its happy consequences. All such pay-secured to them by the laws of the land, would ments I regard as sacred payments-payments of debts which we owe to God; and we seem, in some degree, to be laying up treasure in heaven, when we spend our money on things connected with heaven, and which have heaven in view. "Now, when I began to think seriously and religiously about these things, and knew "You know, Elford, we could not agree about this the other day; not that I think the farmer is a gainer-far from it; so pray go on with what you were about to tell me. But I would ask, first of all, are tithes always properly employed? I could mention several instances in which they are not." this country have been what it is? Í firmly believe not. Besides, if other men neglect their duties, and abuse their privileges, is that any reason why I should not do and value mine?" 66 Certainly not," said Avery. "But I will now proceed to tell you another effect that this view of tithes had on me. You know I left the farm that I held in Mr. Carter's parish, and took one in another part of the country, which was tithe-free. I did not choose it on that account, as you may guess from what I have been saying to you; for, with my notions about tithes, I thought it rather a curse than a blessing to be tithe-free." "Why, as for a matter of money," said Avery, "if we do not pay it in tithe, we pay it in rent; but I do not see the evil you speak of-however, I daresay you will make out a good case." "I do not know about making out a good case, as you call it; I will tell a plain tale, and the truth needs no dressing up. "Now, tithe-free land I look upon as land which has got rid of the very thing which carries with it the acknowledgment that God is the Lord of it, and that all its fruitfulness is from him. There are some men who live without God in the world; tithe-free land I look upon as land without God in the world, if I may so speak. Both I believe to be without God's blessing. 66 My landlord, to whom I was talking about it one day, said that he had paid a great sum of money to get his estate made tithe-free, that he might not have the trouble and bother of paying tithe year after year, and never knowing exactly what he might be called upon to pay. But I told him that I thought what he had done, was all one as if a man, who did not like some daily duty or other, should try and substitute something else in its stead; or, as if a man, who was in the habit of saying his prayers night and morning, should think it just the same thing to say them fourteen times over on the Sunday, and make that do for all the rest of the week. "We do see this principle acted upon in several of those duties, in which we ought to be continually exercising ourselves; as, for instance, almsgiving. There are people who do not like paying year after year to some charitable institution or other; so they give their money all in a lump, and have done with it, as they say: but this does not look as if love was working with their faith. "But, whilst talking over these matters, my landlord mentioned a singular fact, which was this, that the lay impropriator to whom he had paid the money for the redemption of the tithes on his estate, immediately laid it out on a new house, which was hardly completed before it was burnt to the ground. So you see, between one party and the other, God was robbed for ever of the tithe of this estate. My landlord had paid a sum to redeem it, and consequently considered himself quit of the obligation to pay any more; and the sum of money paid all went away in vapour of smoke; whereas, had the tithe not been redeemed, but paid year after year, there was still the possibility that the lay impropriator might be led || to employ it on purposes for which it was originally given, instead of spending it on his own private pleasures. "However, I could not undo what had been done. I had of course to pay a rent equal to tithe and rent; and I determined that, notwithstanding my landlord had taken off what I call God's mark from his land, I would still acknowledge, in his own way, that the produce was owing to his blessing. So I set apart, as well as I could, according to the year, not a tithe, for I could not do that-I could not pay it twice over, but something every year instead of tithe, and put it wrapped up in paper into the plate at the offertory on Christmas-day. "Three or four years after I had been there, the vicar discovered, by some means or other, that I was the person who was in the habit of making this offering, and asked me my reason. "I frankly told him, saying, when lands are tithe-free, they appear to me to have rubbed off, as it were, God's mark, and are as if they did not like to own him as the Great Proprietor; and that, as I wished to have God's blessing on my labours, I had set apart a portion, though a very small one, of the fruits of my land, to be spent in his service; whereas I did not feel sure that what went to my landlord, in the room of tithe, was not spent upon horses and dogs, and beasts that perish, instead of immortal souls, or things connected with their welfare. "I was not then looking out for praise, as I did once before. The testimony of a good conscience is better than any praise: praise always carries with it something painful, because so far beyond what we really deserve. I felt thankful that God had put it into my heart to do right; and he seemed, moreover, to accept what I had done; for, on an occasion of great distress, a winter or two before the circumstance I have just mentioned took place, the vicar said at a public meeting, 'I should not have been able to do so much for such and such a family, and what I have been instrumental in doing has, I believe, saved them from falling victims to a low putrid' fever,-if it had not been for the charitable donation of some unknown individual at the offertory last Christmas-day. Who he is, I know not; but God does. I can only thank him from my heart; God will doubtless reward him openly.' And I can truly say, Avery, I am rewarded openly in the pleasure I receive from paying my tithes. "But do not think all this to be boasting on my part. We are talking together as friends, and you are one who I am anxious should see things in their proper light, and derive that satisfaction from them which I receive." 66 No, Elford, you are the last person I should accuse of boasting; and I feel sure you |