stood barefoot for three days and nights in wintry weather to avert the penalties of an excommunication.

But let the truth ever be remembered, that when, in the earlier stages of their ambition, the bishops of Rome broke away from the moorings of the true faith, they were far from being universally followed in their apostasy. Numbers of leading divines can be readily mentioned who maintained no sort of an alliance with Rome. The renowned Ambrose, who for nearly a quarter of a century ruled the great diocese of Milan, was about as sound in the faith as are our Protestant leaders of the present day. Laurentius, who succeeded to the see of Milan in the next century, held substantially identical opinions. In A.D. 590 the Bishop of Rome was spurned as a false teacher by a number of other prelates. We might even point to Columba of our own Iona, and to Patrick in Ireland as exemplars of pure Gospel teaching. Even in the ninth century there were not wanting bold exponents of the truth, e.g. :—

"The mantle of Ambrose descended on Claudius, Archbishop of Turin. This man beheld with dismay the stealthy approaches of a power which, putting out the eyes of men, bowed their necks to the yoke, and bent their knees to idols. He grasped the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, and the battle which he so courageously waged, delayed, though it could not prevent, the fall of his church's independence; and for two centuries longer the light continued to shine at the foot of the Alps. Claudius was an earnest and an indefatigible student of Holy Scripture. That Book carried him back to the first age, and set him down at the feet of Apostles at the feet of One greater than Apostles; and while darkness was descending on the earth, around Claude still shone the day."

Yet when popery became something like dominant, the Waldensian Church shone as a bright light in the valleys of the Alps. The Waldenses were the working church of their day; and they are supposed to have read the New Testament in the vulgar tongue. In the guise of pedlars the evangelists went stealthily forth two and two, to traverse far and wide the countries overshadowed by their native mountains. Rome also had her enemies in the Paulicians and the Albigenses; and in the opening years of the thirteenth century we see the Pope Innocent the Third, by every iniquitous agency under his command, making a too successful endeavour to annihilate religion in the world. Innocent III. was as fair an exponent of the papacy as history affords; and this confession implies that he was crafty, unprincipled and cruel. It was he who marshalled all the fanatics of Europe to serve in a war of extermination, bribing them by indulgences and promises of paradise. The territory of the Albigenses, destined to be utterly ruined by the cruel invaders, is thus described :

"The France of those days, instead of forming an entire monarchy, was parted into four grand divisions. It is the most southerly of the four, or Narbonne-Gaul, to which our attention is now to be turned. This was an ample and goodly territory, stretching from the Dauphinere Alps on the east to the Pyrenees on the southwest, and comprising the modern provinces of Dauphine, Provence, Languedoc or Gascogne. It was watered throughout by the Rhone, which descended upon it from the north, and it was washed on its southern boundary by the Mediterranean. Occupied by an intelligent population, it had become under their skilful husbandry

one vast expanse of corn-land and vineyard, of fruit and forest trees. To the riches of the soil were added the wealth of commerce, in which the inhabitants were tempted to engage by the proximity of the sea and the neighbourhood of the Italian Republics. Above all, its people were addicted to the pursuits of art and poetry. It was the land of the troubadour. It was further embellished by the numerous castles of a powerful nobility, who spent their time in elegant festivities and gay tournaments."

This was the scene of action-the retreat of Protestantism before the Reformation; and the Catholic manner in which the campaign was conducted is seen in the fact that sixty thousand victims were slaughtered at one time in the town of Beziers. The Pope's legate who accompanied the crusaders, knew nothing about making distinctions between certain classes. “Kill all! kill all !" he cried; and the spirit of popery in the thirteenth century was in no wise different from what it is in the nineteenth. It were vain to stain our pages and to disgust the reader with further recitals of the doings of "the faithful." Atrocities similar to those of Beziers were committed in other towns. As if all this were insufficient, the Inquisition was hatched in those stirring days, and by children of hell, who called themselves sons of the Church, being owned as such. Let us duly weigh these events and ponder well their lessons. They represent a catalogue of frightful crimes, each of which is characteristic of the Church of Rome. "She blew the trumpet of vengeance, summoned to arms the half of Europe, and crushed the rising forces of reason and religion under an avalanche of savage fanaticism."

It might be a nation or it might be an individual that threatened the ascendency of so accursed a system; the spirit manifested by the apostate Church was the same. She was ready to sacrifice either one or the other. In her machinations against Berengarius, the first opponent of the follies of transubstantiation; and against Wicliffe, the stout-hearted enemy of priestcraft, as well as in the fires in which she consumed Jerome and Huss, we sce popery as she was and as she is. Instead of the spirit of Christ we have a spirit of fierce propagandism and of worldly ambition pushed to its extreme degree. The choicest spirits given by God to the world were freely sacrificed; and yet in so gracious and mysterious a manner was good brought out of evil that the cause of truth was advanced by the very means used to hinder its progress.

The opposition ever manifested by popery to the circulation of the pure Word of God is of itself more than sufficient to prove the system to be one of darkness. This opposition amounts to an insane hatred, and in past ages has been in all respects infamous and devil-like. Men who dealt in Bible lore she has watched with lynx eyes, pursued them unto death, and when the Book could no longer be wholly proscribed she has not scrupled to adulterate even the page of inspiration itself. The man to whom the English nation is most deeply indebted for her present translation of the Bible is William Tyndale; and it is well to remember that the Popish Church on the Continent persecuted and hunted our Reformer even unto death. One of the most affecting passages in the annals of the Reformation is the picture which the Reformer gives of himself in a letter addressed to the Governor of

the Castle of Vilvorde, and quoted by Mr. Demaus in his standard life of Tyndale :

“I believe, right worshipful, that you are not ignorant of what has been determined concerning me; therefore I entreat your lordship, and that by the Lord Jesus, that if I am to remain here during the winter, you will request the procureur to be kind enough to send me from my goods which he has in his possession, a warmer cap, for I suffer extremely from cold in the head, being afflicted with a perpetual catarrh, which is considerably increased in the cell. A warmer coat also, for that which I have is very thin; also a piece of cloth to patch my leggings: my overcoat has been worn out; my shirts also are worn out. He has a woollen shirt of mine, if he will be kind enough to send it. I have also with him leggings of thicker cloth for putting on above; he also has warmer caps for wearing at night. I wish also his permission to have a candle in the evenings, for it is wearisome to sit alone in the dark. But, above all, I entreat and beseech your clemency to be urgent with the procureur that he may kindly permit me to have my Hebrew Bible, Hebrew Grammar, and Hebrew Dictionary, that I may spend my time with that study. And in return may you obtain your dearest wish, provided always that it be consistent with the salvation of your soul. But if any other resclution has been come to concerning me, that I must remain during the whole winter, I shall be patient, abiding the will of God to the glory of the grace of my Lord Jesus Christ, whose spirit I pray may ever direct your heart."

Distinguish between popery and the Church; for in no sense is Romanism worthy of being labelled with the latter term. It is self-righteousness run mad and bearing the unlovely fruits of the worst attributes of humanity. Whatever tendencies there may be in our own day to revive a partially effete system of priestcraft, are retrogressive tendencies towards that mediæval night which happily no amount of modern fanaticism will be able to revive. Still we believe the spirit of the thing to be identical with that of the gallant abbot of Citraux, who, in the service of his master the Pope, slaughtered sixty thousand victims in the streets of Beziers.

G. HOLDEN PIKE.

France.- Singular History of a New Chapel.

[The following account of the formation of a new cause, and the opening of a chapel at Dannemoine, near to Tonnerre (Yonne) will be read with interest. It is translated from Le Christianisme aux 19me Siècle. The writer is M. Perrenond, of Tonnerre, an agent of the Evangelical Society of France, who is supported by the Evangelical Continental Society.-R. S. ASHTON.]

"ONE day, in the month of January, 1871, three young men from the village of Dannemoine came to me with the request that I would go and say a mass for them in honour of St. Vincent, the patron-saint of vine-growers. They gave as the reason for asking me that their curé used to say it for nothing, but this year he demanded 120 francs (£4 16s.), and this they would never agree to give, because of his evil conduct towards his parishioners. I told them I did not say masses, but that I would gladly go and preach the Gospel to them, and that the first part of my discourse would have for its object the substitution of Jesus Christ in the place of St. Vincent. The young

men accepted my offer, and, on the day appointed, I found the dancing hall decorated with white hangings and with verdure. I preached the everlasting Word to a great crowd. At the close of the meeting the three young men, who had come to me the day before, besought me to inaugurate a commemorative monument, raised by public subscription, in memory of two young men of the village, who had died in the defence of their country during the Franco-Prussian war. After having obtained the authority of the mayor, I again preached the Good News, and the people were deeply moved. Encouraged by this beginning, I started a monthly meeting in the dancing-hall, which was as at first very well attended. But the curé, having been removed on account of his evil conduct, and replaced by an amiable young man, all who came, because of their hatred of the curé, prudently withdrew. The Gospel had, however, borne fruit in more than one heart, and the meetings, although much less numerously attended, were not interrupted until last summer, and then under the following circumstances:--A retired ex-captain of Perrigny (another of the offshoots of the church at Tonnerre) demanded from me a public discussion on Protestantism, in which the cause of evangelical truth triumphed. The day after this struggle my adversary lodged a complaint in the hands of the prefect, who transmitted it to the town-council of Tonnerre. These gentlemen ordered an inquiry, the result of which was negative. Finding himself defeated in that quarter, M. N. appealed to the Minister of the Interior, who so far granted his appeal, that he decided that henceforth we could only hold meetings in places set apart for Protestant worship. Hearing this, I appealed to Mrs. Alsop, of London, for the money necessary for the foundation of an evangelical chapel at Dannemoine. Through the aid of this devoted Christian lady my plans were crowned with success. The innkeeper at whose house I held my meetings resolved to shut up his establishment, and to let me have his old billiard-room, that I might convert it into a pretty Protestant chapel, capable of holding 200 persons. Around the pulpit are painted the words, Blessed are those who hear the word of God and do it.' (St. Luke xi. 28.) On the right hand side of the hall,' The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.' (Romans vi. 23.) On the left side, 'God is a spirit, and those who worship Him, must worship Him in spirit and in truth.' (St. John iv. 24.) Yesterday (Sunday), at two o'clock, I opened the chapel. Everything was done by our adversaries to keep the public away from this solemnity. The report was spread that the temple at Tonnerre was closed, and that the chapel at Dannemoine would soon be in the same state; that the proprietor of the house was a Bonapartist, who hired us only to serve the interests of his party. The bills announcing the ceremony were torn to pieces; but all these measures proved vain. More than 200 persons, out of a population of 500, were present at the service, which will leave deep traces in their souls. We can count up already a dozen Roman Catholics, some of whom are attached with all their hearts to Protestantism, and the others are converted to the Lord."

Household Treasury.

THE HEATHEN BOY.

Nor many years ago, as a lady was sitting in the veranda of her house in Burmah, a jungle boy came through the opening in the hedge which served as a gateway, and, approaching her, inquired with eagerness,—

"Does Jesus Christ live here?"

He was a boy about twelve years of age, his hair was matted with filth, and bristling in every direction like the quills of the porcupine, and a dirty cloth of cotton was wrapped in a slovenly manner about his person. "Does Jesus Christ live here?" he asked, as he hastened up the steps of the veranda.

"What do you want with Jesus Christ?" asked the lady.

"I want to see Him and confess to Him."

Why, what have you been doing that you want to confess?"

"Does He live here?" he continued, with great emphasis; "I want to know that. Doing? Why, I tell lies, I steal, I do everything bad. I am afraid of going to hell, and I want to see Jesus Christ, for I heard one of the Loogyees say that He can save me from hell. Does He live here? Tell

me where I can find Him."

"But He does not save people from hell if they continue to do wickedly." "I want to stop doing wickedly," said the boy, "but I can't; I do not know how to stop. The evil thoughts are in me, and the bad deeds come of evil thoughts. What can I do?"

:

"Nothing but come to Jesus Christ, poor boy, like all the rest of us,' the lady softly replied; but she spoke this last in English, so the boy only raised his head with a vacant look.

"You cannot see Jesus Christ now," she added, and was answered by a sharp cry of disappointment. "But I am His friend and follower," said the lady, at which the face of the little listener brightened, and she con tinued: "He has told me in His Word to teach all those who wish to escape from hell how to do so."

The joyful eagerness depicted in the boy's countenance was beyond description. "Tell me, O tell me! Only ask your Master to save me, and I will be your servant for life. Do not be angry. I want to be saved. Save

me from hell!"

The next day the little boy was introduced to the little bamboo schoolhouse in the character of "the wild Karen boy," and such a greedy seeker after truth and holiness had seldom been seen. Every day he came to the white teachers to learn something more concerning the Lord Jesus and the way of salvation; and every day his eagerness increased, and his face gradually lost its indescribable look of stupidity. He was at length baptized, and commemorated the love of that Saviour he had so earnestly sought. He lived a while to testify his sincerity, and then died in joyful hope. He had "confessed," and had found a Deliverer from those sins from which he could not free himself. The lady also has since died, and she and the wild Karen boy have met in the presence of their common Redeemer,