Now let us pray with all our might,
'Here be established Jesus' reign;
Long be their land the source of light,

Blessings attend their native plain!'
For I have heard those truths before,
And I have felt their healing power.
My helpless, wretched state they shewed;
No hope of pardon could I find;
They spake of Jesus' precious blood,
And oped his gospel to my mind.
To that dear Saviour then I flew,
I mercy found, and pardon too.

But, see! the blessed ship draws nigh,
She comes, with healing in her sail;
These are the tears of ecstacy,

Hail, highly favor'd vessel, hail!
Lord! on my knees, I thee adore,

Who thus hast blest my native shore.

Ye choir, who rested on the wing,

When Christ was born, your strains to raise ;
Hither again your music bring,

To aid my song of grateful praise.
Glory to God who reigns above,
To man, salvation, peace, and love.

HOME.

'Tis home! that dear attractive name I sing,
The fount of pleasure and of love the spring.
As when the pleased, yet dazzled eye surveys
A gay partérre, with radiant colors sheen,
It marks each beauty with a glance of praise,
Yet turns refreshed on the surrounding green :
So turns affection to the social scene.
Variety may serve to please awhile,

S. S. S.

May seem to fill home-felt enjoyment's place; Yet, soon we languish for the peaceful smile, With which love unrestrained adorns the face, And sigh our old employments to embrace. From scenes more splendid, Home! I turn to thee, No place so sweet, no name so dear to me! S. S. S.

THE

YOUTHS' MAGAZINE;

OR,

EVANGELICAL MISCELLANY.

AUGUST, 1845.

SIGNS OF THE TIMES.

Ir has been well observed, that "the eye remembers We have, therefore, been induced so to embody some o the characteristics of the times in which we live as to impress them upon the memory through the medium of this organ. Again and again have we raised our feeble protest against those mischievous innovations in the church, which are now causing such heartburnings and remonstrances · those semi-popish delusions which are leavening the religion of the gospel; but we doubt whether any of the remarks made by us, from time to time, will impress the subject so forcibly on the attention of our readers, as the pictorial representations, we now offer to their notice.

To those who have watched the Tractarian movement, it must have been matter of no little gratitude and praise to God, that it has been in most cases so promptly and vigorously met in a spirit worthy of apostolic times—a fact sufficiently illustrated by the history of the notorious stone altar at Cambridge, which forms the subject of the uppermost vignette on the accompanying plate.

A full account of this altar, and the proceedings consequent on its erection, has been already given at p. 136 of our present volume. A few years since, the placing of

such a structure in any of our reformed churches would have excited little attention, and possibly the most conscientious Christian would have remained content to see it employed in the administration of the Lord's Supper. But no sooner does it become the "badge of a party," and the occasion of propagating false and dangerous doctrines, than a noble army is raised up to contend earnestly for the faith delivered to the saints, and to protest that they will not give place, "no, not for an instant," to any God-dishonoring institutions and ordinances which are "not read in Scripture, nor may be proved thereby."

There are two charges laid against the use of such an altar as that represented in our engraving; the first, that it is contrary to the laws, canons, and constitutions ecclesiastical of this realm, which enjoin that the communiontable should be of wood, and moveable, instead of stone, and fixed, as in this instance: and the second, and more serious one, that it should be a table, and not an altar, since the holy sacrament is a feast of memorial, and not a sacrifice-Christ having been already offered once for all, that he might perfect for ever them which are sanctified.

The lower engraving represents a sepulchral monument in Camberwell church-yard, which may be regarded as the type of a new order of designs for such erections. In a poetical light, it has decidedly the advantage of our modern head-stones: but regarded as an innovation in religion, its introduction may be watched with holy jealousy by some. The cross has been, and still is, fearfully abused, by inducing that veneration towards the symbol which is due only to Him of whom it is the feeble figure. The inscription is, in this instance, unexceptionable, consisting merely of an ascription of praise to God, a simple record of the death it commemorates, and that well-known text-" O Lord, in thee have I trusted, let me never be confounded!" If we were disposed to find fault with any thing about it,