THE SERPENT AND THE CHILD. A MOTHER'S eye its watches kept, O'er where her infant lay and slept Upon a warm and fragrant bank, Where wild flowers grew all wild and rank. Disporting gay, in summer's bloom, And round its richest perfumes shed. Its placid, sweet, and cherub face, When, lo! her anxious eye beholds A deadlier tooth has pierced his heart, And all life's future pains and pangs, Is there no balm to heal the wound? Newport, I. W. TO MY INFANT BOY. "Hail lovely miniature of life!" My dear babe, well pleased thy father But, should clouds of darkness gathering, But, my precious smiling infant, These be thine-then we are happy. A. M. THE MISSIONARY CHAPEL. WHAT a blessing is the Gospel of Christ! But alas! like many other great blessings, it is little thought of by some. The air, the sunshine, and the rain, are all great blessings, and we could not live without them; yet some people think little about them. The Gospel is the greatest of all blessings, and yet even it is not thought of by many. Suppose we were without the Gospel, how should we be then? We should have no sabbaths, no bible, no preaching, no schools, no books, as we have now. You would not like that. If God were to say, "I will take all these away, for you do not seem to care about them," should we not all say, "Oh Lord, do not do that. Do not take them away. We will try to make better use of them." Yes: perhaps the best way for us to learn the value of gospel blessings, is to imagine ourselves without them. How should we wish them back again if taken from us but one year! The poor heathen in the dark places of the earth are without them. They never keep holy the sabbath day; they have not the word of God, and they never hear his glorious gospel. They know not God, nor Jesus Christ whom he has sent to save us. They have not heard of heaven or hell. Instead of all this, they bow down and worship idols which they themselves have made. Their way of life is sinful and very wicked, so wicked that it is a shame to tell the wicked things they do. And, as the bible says, "The dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty." You could not help weep ing were I to tell you how cruelly some of them treat their own children. How sad, then, is their condition! They are wretched in this life, and have no hope of a better life to come. They think that they are only like the animals around them, and that when they die there will be an end of them. They know nothing of a resurrection from the dead by the mighty power of the Lord Jesus. Feeling compassion for them, many good people have subscribed money to send christian teachers to them, called missionaries. You have heard of missionaries before. They are always such as love the Lord Jesus themselves, and wish to tell of his love to others. And for this they are willing to leave their friends, and homes, and country, and go thousands of miles over the wide deep sea. When they arrive among the heathen they are often in great danger, and it always takes a long time before they can make the people understand what they wish to tell them. Sometimes it takes many years before they see any good come of their labours. But if they live they persevere, and God blesses them in what they do for his glory. Sometimes the missionaries have much to do to find a place in which to live, and often they have to build houses for themselves. And not only houses for themselves, but places of worship, and schools in which to teach their children. The picture at the head of this is a representation of a chapel and school-room erected by the missionaries. They are plain rough-looking places, but they do very well. Oh, how glad the missionaries must be when they see men and women, and their children, coming on a sabbath morning |