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with fervent heat,-in the light of hell,—in the light of heaven-the light of an endless eternity!

We see what great benefit one messmate,-one fellow-apprentice, or fellowservant,--one shipmate, or comrade, one schoolfellow,-one acquaintance, or friend, one fellow-prisoner, may, under the blessing of God, confer upon another. And we are solemnly reminded that God requires all men, in their respective stations in life, to be habitually on the watch for opportunities of winning souls to Christ.

This young man, from the day his heart was opened to receive the Gospel, up to the day he landed in the colony, was enabled to maintain a most consistent and irreproachable character.

REJOINDER TO EUGENE ON INFIDEL CHALLENGES,

Mr. Eugene,

Some months ago it was announced by hand-bill in Newcastle, that a reply would be forthcoming to my pamphlet, entitled, "Infidel Challenges." In due time it appeared. It purports to have been written by you, sir, about whom some inquiries have been made, but whom nobody knows. All the more difficult it is to find you, that your brochure scorns to bear either a printer's or a publisher's name.

No need was there for an apology for a reply, though there might be for such a reply as you have made.

I might surely be permitted to dedicate "Infidel Challenges" to the Secular society, even though as a whole it had been among the things that were, inas much, as its leader does not "abandon the past," and has told us with his own pen-"I am an Infidel, an Atheist, and also a Socialist," now he would add 'also a Secularist." I must call you by your old name, till any new one you "The adopt is known, in order to mark your identity. Had I called you, Free Protestant Association," who would have known that I meant an antiChristian society? The police reports describe the old clothes a robber wears, until they know what new dress he has "donned."

You ask if I doubt that you desire the sifting criticism of your opinions. Undoubtedly I do, and if you are very anxious to know, I can tell you the reason why. In this charge I do not include all Secularists. Some I believe have taken that position from the very sentiment of fair-play.

"The press, pulpit, and platform dare not ignore us." Do you come to this conclusion because they speak out against you, and declare you to be wanting in all that is needed to man's elevation? "Eminent ministers, such as the Rev. Mr. Binney, devote ably written books to a consideration of our views;" and, you should have added to a condemnation of them. "The Newspaper honours us with leading articles ;" then you consider notoriety honour. "Independency assigns us a missionary," whom you resolve not to hear, because you like "both sides!" "Even you lecture and write against us, and discuss with us; " and will continue to do so as long as I think it of service to the truth and to the

people. "We have become one of the questions of the day;" rather a queer question. "Prize essays against us, rain:" but you, who do not use figures, wear secular waterproofs to keep it off. You must have been among the clouds when you penned this last, for I am not aware that you have got more than a small part of a shower of one "prize essay," and may, therefore, think yourselves tolerably well off. "The result of all which is that our numbers increase, and we grow in strength;" do you mean on paper, or is this intended to secure for yourselves a little respite?

If

"Will you tell us when the 'Reasoner's' open page was closed, when about to be used in right earnest against Secularism, and what statements were garbled?" Some of Mr. Grant's letters were not inserted, and others were garbled. you want them, I can give you more modern instances. To prove by facts that the best statements on the Christian side have not been inserted, would require me to reprint the seventeen volumes of the Reasoner; but you will perhaps be satisfied with Mr. Holyoake's statement that he had not read any Christian book for some years, except Mr. Newman's "Sorrows of the Soul," and therefore could not insert the best arguments on the Christian side If, however, you will point me to a single page in all these volumes, where the Christian argument is fairly and fully put, I shall gladly withdraw the charge. "But why all this hubbub about our past course? Assuredly I do, but not in secular progress; though I should be happy to perceive any signs of amendment.

You believe in progress?"

"You deny the correctness of the report given by Mr. Holyoake, of your first meeting with him.” Yes, I do; because he cited it as an illustration, that discussion is utterly distrusted. Now I am conscious that I have neither dreaded nor evaded debate; nor do I now. If Mr. Holyoake wishes the truth to prevail, he will only be thankful that I have done something to rectify the false impression which his statements were fitted to make, as his second volume does not seem likely soon to come to a second edition. "But what matters it whether a challenge was given or accepted? Why was the discussion not held?" Not you tell us on account of the money question, for Mr. Holyoake would hold his hat in the market-place for a few pence, rather than that the denial of half the proceeds should prevent him from meeting me. This was very magnanimous; but it did not last long, for in six months from that date, he writes to me, “Once for all, I say that I will debate with no one who refuses me the means of living while I do it. * * * I am willing to go to any town in England to debate two or three nights in the week, provided the committee of management guarantee me two guineas each night." Had he come at first, I am sure there would have been no necessity for his holding his hat in the market-place; for all I sought was, that both of us should not be subjected to the imputation of venality, which did not preclude his receiving his necessary expenses, if his friends

had not sufficient interest in the people to defray them. The reason, you say why Mr. Holyoake did not come, was, that his "physicians forbade him." Yet his amanuensis writes, in the passage part of which you quote, "Had the discussion been pending he would probably have gone.

"But in March, 1851, and later in the same season, Mr. H. lectured in Newcastle, and you were not present." And for a very good reason: I did not previously know of his intention to lecture, and had engagements elsewhere that could not be postponed. He took advantage of my absence to say, "The continued absence of the Rev. J. H. Rutherford from the discussion to which he so vauntingly challenged me, is producing its fruits of reaction against his cause. That one so enthusiastic and so well able to do battle for Zion should frequent all obscure places in preference to appearing in the arena he once so valorously selected for himself, is a matter of dangerous wonder to those who, not being able to appear in person in defence, expect their preachers to defend their opinions for them." What right had Mr. H. or any one else to expect me to neglect my ordinary, but important work, to be at his beck and call whenever he saw fit to make his appearance, without any previous intimation of it. It was ra· ther his clogging debate with the condition of two guineas per night that was matter of wonder to those who knew he had said that he would "hold his hat in the market-place for pence" rather than be disappointed of a discussion with me.

I could have no reason for saying that I was absent from Newcastle when I received Mr. H's. letter of July 30th, if I was at home. From the first sentence of that letter he seems to be well aware of the fact, he writes, "Your absence from Newcastle this week, &c."

"It will be soon enough," you say, "to draw a comparison between Christian and secular effort, when a fair field is conceded to Secularism." Who can prevent you from instructing the young, from visiting the fatherless, and the widows, from helping the poor, from reclaiming the drunkard, from labouring for the general good? Will you delay helping a suffering world till it costs you nothing? "To express our opinions," you say, "is an indictable offence." I am sorry if it is so, and will do all I can to secure for you the same freedom of thought, speech, and action, that I claim for myself. But what then? According to you, opinions are of no consequence, therefore you cannot think it a crime to keep them for yourselves; and I know of no law preventing you from doing deeds of kindness and mercy.

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"You say our system is heartless and calculating." I do, and that because I think it; and I think it because Mr. Holyoake will not discuss without a guarantee of two guineas per night, nor Mr. Barker without half of the proceeds; and you excuse yourselves for doing nothing but find fault with everybody else by alleging that you are persecuted. But you tell me the Christian system

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is "heartless, infamous, and immoral," because it represents the Diety as 'drowning a world because the creatures of his hands had gone astray," and 'consigning" the majority of men to "utter and endless misery." Nothing could be further from the truth. Christ came to save men from the sin, whose consequences are so terrible and so just. And, if men in their selfishness, and society, who shall dare to blame the

depravity render themselves a curse to

Judge of all that they meet a self-chosen and merited doom.

You do not like my advice to the "two dear friends," to discuss whether either of them can be trusted. But if they cannot be trusted, how will they upset orthodoxy as you expect? They are proofs that human nature is not a sufficient guarantee for morality. I do not object to a friendship between the two gentlemen; I only say that it is worth nothing, if it is not founded on mutual esteem. "Does Christianity, you ask, not enjoin forgiveness ?" It does, but they believe in neither Christianity nor forgiveness. I do not wish to see them get up a quarrel," but I wish the working classes to see that, if they could call each other hypocrites without reason, their invectives against the Bible are not to be relied on. Why should I fear Mr. Barker? An opponent who tries to drown your voice by noise, to drive you from the platform, who will not debate with you on fair and honourable terms, is surely not to be dreaded. I have accepted his challenge both at Newcastle, Sunderland, Northampton, and Liverpool, yet he is likely to get away to America without our having a discussion.

I have nothing to alter in the account which I gave of my meeting with Mr. B. in the Music Hall here. You say I laughed at his reply. If I did, it was involuntarily and you surely cannot blame one who is "the creature of circumstances." I do not pretend that my audiences are perfect, or that they always treat opponents with becoming courtesy ; but I use all my influence to lead them to do so, which Mr. Barker does not. On this point I am willing that you should judge of me by my deeds. Have I ever failed in exerting all the influence that I have in securing for opponents at my lectures a fair and patient hearing?

You call upon me to point to one Secular society that has changed its name. Do you not know that the Liverpool Secularists call themselves, "The Free Protestant Association ?"

You assure me that the Newcastle Secular Society is not "dead;" is it then asleep? You ask me if I brought "the Young Men's Christian Association " to an untimely end. I never either lectured for that society, nor had any connection with it. You tell me that you "can afford to let my standing offer of debate stand, until I become better acquainted with you than to address you as Infidels." If it displeases you, I am sorry that I cannot find a name more descriptive of your position. But why do you find fault with it when your leader, who declares he has nothing to be ashamed of in the past, said broadly, "I am

also an Infidel," and when Mr. Barker still frequently uses the name.

You will not surely from dread of a mere name withhold light from the people. Noble character has often ere now thrown a halo of glory around a name of reproach.

I

Finally, be assured, I have no interest either to talk or write you down. Yourselves I should be glad to serve if it is in my power; your creed, I regard as one of the poorest and emptiest ever propounded, and will say so as long as can prove it. As you pray that one day, I may be found battling as constantly, earnestly, and bravely for the Truth, as I now do for Error, you will not take it amiss, if I pray that you may yet perceive in Christianity the highest incentive to manly effort here, and the best preparation for the great future.

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Whatever there may be now-in the days of Paul, at least, there were men who turned the grace of God into licentiousness, and who ranked among the privileges of the gospel an immunity for sin. And it is striking to observe the effect of this corruption on the mind of the apostle ;-that he who braved all the terrors of persecuting violence, that he who stood undismayed before kings and governors, and could lift his intrepid testimony in the hearing of an enraged multitude that he who, when bound by a chain between two soldiers, still sustained an invincible constancy of spirit, and could live in fearlessness, and triumph, with the dark imagery of an approaching execution in his eye-that he who counted not his life dear unto him, and whose manly breast bore him up amidst all the threats of human tyranny, and the grim apparatus of martyrdomthat this man so firm and undaunted, wept like a child when he heard of those disciples that turned the pardon of the cross into an encouragement for doing evil. The fiercest hostilities of the gospel's open enemies he could brave, but when he heard of the foul dishonour done to the name of his Master by the moral worthlessness of those who were the gospel's professing friends, this he could not bear-all that firmness which so upheld him unfaltering and unappalled in the battles of the faith, forsook him then; and this noblest of champions on the field of conflict and of controversy, when he heard of the profligacy of his own converts was fairly overcome by the tidings, and gave way to all the softness of womanhood. When every other argument then fails for keeping you on the path of integrity and holiness, O think of the argument of Paul in tears! It may be truly termed a picturesque argument-nor are we aware of more impressive testimony in the whole compass of Scripture, to the indispensable need of virtue and moral goodness in a believer-that is to be found in that passage where Paul says of these unworthy professors of the faith, For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.' CHALMERS.

THE POPE AND THE BEGGAR.

Secularism has not and cannot have any poetry. It lacks inspiration. In its poverty it has appropriated the following ode of Bulwer's as an illustration of the secular doctrine, Deeds, not Creeds'! The ode, however, belongs not to

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