an evening prayer. If, when you are ill, you say in your heart, "Oh Father, help me to be patient; or when you have done wrong, ·Father, forgive me," you have prayed aright; and God sees and accepts those silent prayers. But do not let these silent prayers be all: put them often into words, lest you should forget to pray. As you try to put them into words, more and more thoughts will come-and prayer, in time, will become a delight to you. Others of you say, "You are too young to pray to God." Too young and he your Father? Does not a father like to hear his little one speak to him? even though it be only lisping out his name? And He who has given you your tongue, and your powers of speech, will not He like that you should speak to Him, and thank Him? Oh! do not be afraid! You may speak to Him, in feeblest, simplest language, such as might offend the great men of the earth, but it will not offend Him. A loving father is pleased with a first present from his little one, be it ever such a trifle;-and the Father, who is all love, is pleased to accept our offerings of praise and thanks, worthless though they be. If He is our Father, then we need not fear to speak to Him,-for are not we His own children? who Of those say, Why should we pray? it makes no difference: things happen just the same," I would ask, "What would you think of a man, who being the son of a noble and virtuous father, should turn away from all intercourse with that father; and even though invited to converse with him, should prefer to associate only with foolish children, or senseless brutes? His kind and loving father might still keep unaltered his plans for his poor son's daily employments, his provision for his daily wants;-but oh! what a difference must it make in that son's character, his neglecting the privilege of intercourse with such a father, for the sake of low and profitless friendships and his intercourse with the Almighty,-all-wise, all-loving Father, less precious, less to be desired! Ah! if we could but once really know how blessed,-how excellent it is to get nearer to God, to have His love swelling our hearts,His presence lifting up our souls-we should never again ask, "Why should we pray; or dare to say that "Things happen just the same, whether we pray or neglect to pray." We should never again wish to neglect any act by which we might draw nearer to His holy presence. True, He does know what we want better than we can tell Him; but it is not useless to speak to Him of our wants: the very speaking of them will make us feel them more truly, and incite us to labour more earnestly to remedy or remove them. And that it is His pleasure that we should pray to Him, is plain; for it is He who has made our souls, so that in joy they feel as if they must pour out their thanks-and in danger, as if they must cry, "Save us save us!" 66 I have yet a few words to say to those who, when I ask, "Do you ever pray?" answer Yes; I never forget to say my prayers, night and morning." "Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall." You, who say your prayers night and morning, beware lest you pray not. To pray, is to speak from your heart. Let not, then, your lips utter anything that your heart does not feel. You would be ashamed to stand before kings and princes, and speak words, while your thoughts wandered far away to other things. Tremble, then, so to insult the holy Lord of heaven and earth. Let your words be as few and as simple as you please; only let them be earnest and sincere: let your heart go along with them. HOPE FOR THE MORROW. Hope! ye who lowly are bound, Who feel the keen touch of grief's arrow! Hope is the pole-star of sorrow! Rally the spirit that downward is hurled,— Be not dejected or sad, 'Twill only leave beauty a furrow; Soon shall the grieving rejoice and be glad, Hope! there is joy in "to-morrow." Death, with its pangs, will at last Life and its liberty borrow; Be not reluctant! relinquish the past! J. ORMROD. As travellers in a foreign country make every sight a lesson; so onght we in this our pilgrimage. Thou seest the Heaven rolling above thine head in a constant and immoveable motion; the stars so overlooking one another that the greatest shew little, the least greatest; all glorious: the air full of the bottles of rain, or fleeces of snow, or divers forms of fiery exhalations: the sca under one uniform face, full of strange and monstrous shapes beneath: the earth so adorned with variety of plants that thou canst not but tread on many at once with every foot, besides the store of creatures that fly about it, walk upon it, live in it. Thou idle truant, dost thou learn nothing of so many masters? Hast thou so long read these capital letters of God's great book, and canst thou not yet spell one word of them ?-Bishop Hall. MOSES IN EGYPT. BEYOND the blue waters of the Mediterranean, and stretching away far into that unknown Continent which is still a mystery and a wonder to our northern nations, there is a country which lies for ever as a border-land between the desert and the river. Both claim it for their own;-and for thousands of years, even before man dwelt there, or, for aught we know, before he dwelt anywhere, a never-ending warfare has been maintained between them for its possession. Now the desert has invaded this fair land, and pushed its desolating conquests eastwards, till its burning sands have been even scattered upon the surface of the ever-flowing waters:—and then, again, the river has gathered its mighty strength, and risen against its foe, and spread its fertilising waves over the land, till they reached the foot of the rocky mountains that lie along its western borders;. and they stood up, and said-" So far; but no farther." But for that mighty river the desert would have reigned supreme. From east to west it would have spread its burning sands over that vast Continent, and looked on one side over the wide Atlantic, and on the other over the waters of the Red Sea, towards its brother deserts of Arabia. From ocean to ocean, and from the northern Mediterranean to those southern regions that we know not of, it would have declared, with the hot breath of the Simoom, "This is my realm :-man comes not here:-or if he comes, it must be as a pilgrim and a wanderer-as a stranger and an alien. No home shall he find within my borders :-no pastures shall feed his flocks :: -no waters shall quench his thirst:-no fruits shall spring from my bosom to supply his wants :-no habitation shall be found, that I will not entomb beneath a mountain, or scatter abroad with the hot blast of the hurricane. Here I will reign alone:—and I will reign amid solitude, and silence, and desolation." So would the desert say, if there were none yet greater than the desert to answer it. But soon, from the unknown regions of the south, there come rolling onwards the waters of a mighty river. They say not whence they come, and no man knoweth. But all know whither they are bound. "To the north-and to the ocean"-is their cry:"Onwards-onwards-for ever onwards." Yes-onwards still they flow, and where they come, the desert shrinks away confounded. Along their banks a green border of fertility appears. The thirsty ground drinks in the welcome moisture. Life and fertility spring np on every side. Grass and flowers, herbs and trees, and all the spontaneous growth of the south, are spread over the land. The palm tree rises high above the surrounding verdure, and waves its leaves gracefully in the gentle wind. The papyrus springs up along the margin of the river, or fringes the banks of the marshes left by its overflowing waters. The white lotus-that peculiar flower of Egypt, which is still found carved in imperishable granite on so many of its monuments-floats in profusion upon the still surface of the pool, and with its broad leaves almost hides its watery home from the burning rays of its destroying enemy above. Bulrushes, and water plants of a hundred species, clothe the borders of the stream with a long broad line of the richest verdure. All nature seems to be springing forth into young life: the desert forgets its barrenness; and the bright sun is no longer feared, but worshipped. Then comes man, with his flocks and herds, and leads them to feed upon the green pastures, and beside the still waters :-and not content with the unbidden growth of warmth and moisture, he cultivates the ground, and casts his seed abroad, and waits for the golden fruits of the promised harvest. And then the tents of wandering tribes are seen no more;-but instead of these are houses that have foundations. These houses are gathered into villages:-these villages grow till they become cities:-these cities are adorned with palaces and temples, and are surrounded by roads, and monuments, and aqueducts, and many public works. Gradually all the arts and luxuries of civilisation are developed; and the land, which but for that ever-flowing river would have been a portion of the solitary wilderness, is now become the abode of millions of living men. Such, doubtless, would be the early history of the great land of Egypt, that most ancient and wonderful of nations :-but no record of these distant ages has come down to ours. Darkness rests both upon the infancy of our race, and upon the infancy of every separate portion of it. Men have formed themselves into nations, and a small city has expanded into an empire, before the historian sits down to write the record of its growth, and to tell to future ages the steps by which it gradually advanced to greatness. So it was with Egypt. It rose slowly and silently upon the banks of its parent river, and other tribes and nations only became aware of its existence as they gradually felt the power of its armies, or shared the benefit of its commerce, or heard from the lips of adventurous travellers their stories of the many wonderful things they had beheld there. And when we first meet with the name of Egypt upon the pages of the histories that have come down to modern times and to us distant people, we find it already a civilised and mighty nation. We find vast cities standing upon the banks of that ever-flowing_river;temples, such as the world has never seen in any other land, rearing their huge piles above the fertile plain;-fields waving with rich harvests;-fleets of vessels moving to and fro upon the bosom of the wide water;-thousands of industrious inhabitants swarming over the surface of the country;-captives from conquered kingdoms;-wealth from distant shores;-all the arts of civilisation cultivated and far advanced; and every mark of a highly polished, powerful, and prosperous nation. In these early periods of Egyptian history—that is, about 4,000 years ago there dwelt in one particular province in the northern portion of this vast empire, a considerable colony of people, who from their dress, language, manners, and religion, were at once marked as belonging to some foreign and dissimilar race of men. They were evidently not Egyptians ;-and when any traveller passing through their fields and villages, and observing their peculiar national characteristics, enquired into their history, and asked who they were, and how they came to be found thus dwelling in a land which was evidently not theirs, he was told that their forefathers had come into Egypt some hundred years ago, from across the great Arabian desert, and that their original home was the land of Canaan :—that when first they came here they were only a single family, with their dependants, and that they had left their own country during the pressure of a great famine, and had come with their flocks and herds and all their possessions, at the invitation of the king, and had settled down in this province of Goshen, which he had assigned to them as their dwelling place. Here they had lived from generation to generation, protected by the government, cultivating their lands, feeding their flocks, and continuing to increase and multiply as people do increase and multiply when they are allowed to live in peace with their neighbours, and are surrounded by plenty and comfort, and all that the simple nature of man, unspoiled by luxury, requires for its support and happiness. They had now become, therefore, a very considerable people-almost a little nation, within a nation—and had gradually extended their possessions and spread themselves farther and farther over the surrounding country. This was the outline of their simple story, till within a few years of the period where we now find them. But years rolled on. Other kings sat upon the throne of the Pharaohs, and new generations of men swarmed over the land of Egypt. Now, when these new monarchs found this colony of strangers increasing in numbers and strength, and rising by their industry and intelligence to be a people whom it might be difficult to govern or conciliate, yet dangerous to provoke, they grew jealous of their influence, and resolved, like foolish governors, to try to diminish it by oppression and injustice. Instead of respecting their national |