of them was united and rich, and therefore able to give him a large salary; the other was poor, and so divided that they had driven away their minister. In this condition he applied to his father for advice. An aged coloured servant, who overheard what was said, made this reply; "Massa, go where there is the least money and the most devil." The minister took the advice, united the church, and converted many souls to Christ.

REV. MR. WILLEY.

THE REV. Mr. Willey, of New Hampshire, at a public meeting in Park Street church, Boston, gave the history of a lad in a retired part of the country, to whom a pious lady, after serious conversation, gave the "Saints' Rest." He read it, became deeply interested, and carried it to the barn where he was employed, weeping over its pages, and over his hardness of heart, and praying to be saved from the miseries of the lost. But these impressions died away; and some years after, on the Sabbath, in Boston, he wandered into the very church where the meeting was then assembled, where, under the appeals of the venerable Dr. Griffin, all his former solicitude for his undying soul was revived, and he was led immediately to apply to a clergyman of the city for the "Saints' Rest." After considerable trouble the long-sought volume was found and read, portions of it, time after time, during the week. On the Sabbath this youth was seen in this house, a weeping stranger, sometimes in one part of it and sometimes in another. It was in that gallery, referring to the west gallery, as he has since ventured to hope, he poured out his soul unto God, and that light began to dawn upon him, which has since been as the

rising light of day. This youth was the eldest in a family of ten children, all of whom, together with both parents, have since been brought to hope in the mercy of God, and to unite with his people; and of the five sons, four are in the Christian ministry.

REV. DR. GRIFFIN.

THE late Rev. Dr. E. D. Griffin was exceedingly careful in the preparation of his sermons. Dr. Sprague says that he was once at his house, and in view of preaching, went into his study to read over his sermon. He called for ink and sand, and began to strike out, and to pour on the sand. The manuscript was already black with erasures and insertions, but the work went on, the paper growing darker every moment. One of the little children coming up, and looking on the blotted and blurred manuscript, corrected and re-corrected, said, "How can you read your sermon? It is all scratched out?" He was particular in covering with ink every word erased, so that it I could not be read.

The remark of the child led him to speak of his custom; and said he," This I regard as one chief excellence of my preaching, if I have any." He continued, "I have a plain figure which I use in the study; it will not do for the public ear; but it serves to illustrate my point. If you put swingling tow upon a hetchel, you can ride to Boston on it; but if you pull out the tow," holding up his fingers to represent the process, "and let the points stick up, they will prick: so," added he, "you may cover up the truth with ornaments and words, till the conscience cannot be reached. You must pull out the

tow the points are the truth-pull out the tow, and let the points stick up." A better illustration, as Dr. Sprague remarks, was never given. If our sermons had less "tow," and more naked "points," they would do more execution.

SEVERAL EMINENT CLERGYMEN.

THE Rev. Dr. Hill, of Virginia, some time since, made the following statement at a public meeting of a Tract Society :

I lost my sainted mother when I was a youth, but not before the instructions which I received from her beloved lips had made a deep impression upon my mind; an impression which I carried with me into a college, (Hampden Sidney,) where there was not then one pious student. There I often reflected, when surrounded by young men who scoffed at religion, upon the instructions of my mother, and my conscience was frequently sore distressed. I had no Bible, and dreaded getting one, lest it should be found in my possession. At last I could stand it no longer, and therefore requested a particular friend, a youth whose parents lived near, and who often went home, to ask his pious and excellent mother to send me some religious books. She sent me Alleine's Alarm, an old black book, which looked as if it might have been handled by successive generations for one hundred years. When I got it, I locked my room and lay on my bed reading it, when a student knocked at my door; and although I gave him no answer, dreading to be found reading such a book, he continued to knock and beat the door, until I had to open it. He came in, and seeing the book lying on the bed, he seized it, and examining its title, he said, "Why, Hill, do you read such books?" I hesitated, but God enabled

me to be decided, and tell him boldly, but with much emotion, "Yes, I do." The young man replied with deep agitation, "Oh, Hill, you may obtain religion, but I never can. I came here a professor of religion; but through fear, I dissembled it, and have been carried along with the wicked, until I fear that there is no hope for me." He told me that there were two others, who he believed were somewhat serious. We agreed to take up the subject of religion in earnest, and seek it together. We invited the other two, and held a prayer-meeting in my room on the next Saturday afternoon. And Oh, what a prayer-meeting! We tried to pray, but such prayer I never heard the like of. We knew not how to pray, but tried to do it. It was the first prayer-meeting that I ever heard of. We tried to sing, but it was in a suppressed manner, for we feared the other students. But they found it out, and gathered around the door, and made such a noise, that some of the officers had to disperse them. And so serious was the disturbance, that the President, the late excellent Rev. Dr. John B. Smith, had to investigate the matter at prayers that evening, in the prayers' hall. When he demanded the reason of the riot, a ringleader in wickedness got up and stated, that it was occasioned by three or four of the boys holding prayer-meeting, and they were determined to have no such doings there. The good President heard the statement with deep emotion, and looking at the youths charged with the sin of praying, with tears in his eyes, he said, "Oh, is there such a state of things in this college? Then God has come near to us. My dear young friends, you shall be protected. You shall hold your next meeting in my parlour, and I will be one of your number.” Sure enough, we had our next meeting in his parlour, and half the college was there; and there began the glorious revival of religion, which pervaded the college and spread into the country around. Many of those students became ministers of the gospel. The youth who had brought me Alleine's Alarm from

his mother was my friend, the Rev. C. Still, preaching in this State. And he who interrupted me in reading the work, my venerable and worthy friend, the Rev. Dr. H is now pre sident of a college in the West.

REV. E. T. TAYLOR.

A PIOUS English widow, who resided among ignorant and vicious neighbors in the suburbs of Boston, Mass., determined to do what she could for their spiritual benefit. She opened her little front room for weekly prayer-meetings, and engaged some pious Methodists to aid in conducting them.

Among others who attended was a young sailor of intelligent and prepossessing countenance. A slight acquaintance showed him to be very ignorant of even the rudiments of education; but he had evidently such superior talents that the widow became much interested in his spiritual welfare, and prayed much that God would instruct and convert him, and make him useful.

But in the midst of her anticipations, he was suddenly summoned away to sea. He had been out but a short time when the vessel was seized by a British privateer and carried into Halifax, N. S., where the crew suffered by a long and wretched imprisonment.

A year had passed away, during which the good woman had heard nothing of the young sailor. Still she remembered and prayed for him with the solicitude of a mother. About this time she also was called to Halifax on business. While there, her habitual disposition to be useful, led her with a few friends to visit the prison with Bibles and tracts. In one apartme t were the American prisoners. As she approached the grat