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nal labours, but extensively throughout the populous districts that surround us. It has pleased God to employ your gifts and influence, in no small degree, in elevating the tone of ministerial character, and giving a wholesome impulse to the Churches in our charge; and while individual ministers have found an edifying example in the Pastor of St. Paul's, Churches generally might have profitably taken a pattern from his congregation. I would not be thought to have had recourse, on this occasion, to the carnal artifice of compliment: I have only desired candidly to state the grounds upon which I would thank God, on your behalf, that His sovereign grace had fitted an instrument, and His providential wisdom had ordered its employment, in a district presenting a scene of such extensive usefulness.

That your labours have been blessed with singular success-that many great and important works have been accomplished, and are still in progress, under your auspices-that your people are united together in a common bond of attachment to their Minister-and that he himself possesses a more than ordinary share of the esteem and reverence of his brethren in the ministry, are facts simply to be expected from the right use of the means, which, under God's blessing, naturally lead to such results. It is this view of an example, which makes it valuable and encouraging, that the difference is not in the man, but in the means. "Brethren, I

That you may be long spared in health, and strength, to minister among us, "and serve your generation, according to the will of God," is the sincere prayer of,

MY DEAR SIR,

YOURS AFFECTIONATELY, IN THE BEST BONDS,

Bilston,

September 23, 1840.

JOS. B. OWEN.

SERMON I

THE SCRIPTURAL PROOF OF CONFIRMATION.

"AND Israel stretched out his right hand, and laid it upon Ephraim's head, who was the younger, and his left hand upon Manasseh's head, guiding his hands wittingly; for Manasseh was the firstborn. And he blessed Joseph, and said, God, before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk, the God which fed me all my life long unto this day, The Angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads."-GEN. xlviii. 14, 15, 16.

You are all of you familiar with the narrative connected with the text-Jacob, stricken in years and about to die, is conferring upon his children the paternal blessing.

In those primitive times, the Patriarch of a family was its spiritual head, as well as its civil ruler; and on solemn. occasions, like that connected with the text, the office of the father and the bishop were united in the acts of leave-taking and benediction, and the parting words of the Patriarch were treasured up, as henceforth the prophecy of the family,the holy tradition which was to pass down their generations, for the guidance and direction of their posterity.

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