Again, if our material is not prepared so as to fit the time appointed for the duration of the lesson, the closing bell may find us not yet arrived at the most important part, the application.

But careful preparation has also positive advantages. A prepared teacher will be an accurate teacherthat is a matter of no small consequence, and he will be a positive teacher. An unprepared teacher can only speak from memory or recollection, and will often not be sure about such and such a point, and if he be undecided what can be expected of his class?

Again, the lessons of a prepared teacher will be characterized by variety. He who sits down Sunday after Sunday in his class, with only old materials to work on, and the re-arrangement even of which he has not studied, will soon have his lessons imbued with monotony and sameness.

Again, if a teacher would have his children interested in their lesson, he must first of all be interested in it himself: and in order to this he must have made himself thoroughly master of the subject by previous preparation. Interest is most catching, and, more. over, it will be the mother of a lively, intelligent, and cheerful manner, and that goes far to recommend the subject of our lessons to the children's hearts and affections.

On all hands, therefore, preparation is most needful and most useful.

Let us notice a few necessary qualifications of useful preparation.

Our preparation should be appropriate, so that our lesson may be suitable to the capacities of our own class. If it be above their comprehension they will go away wearied and confused rather than instructed; and if it be below their mental powers and information, they will be apt to form a low opinion of their teacher, and thence of the truths he teaches.

Our preparation should also be particular, that is, adapted as far as possi

ble to the peculiar wants and circumstances, character and attainments of each child.

Our preparation should be perpetual. Few things happen to us in our daily life which may not in one way or other be made useful in our class. Illustrations from what is happening around us tell with more force than any others; and if we would be always on the look out for these. and would store them up for future use, we should seldom find our lessons run heavily, or the attention of the class flag. The description of a narrow escape from an accident, of a picture in the Exhibition, of the arrest of a criminal who had thought he had cleverly eluded all chance of detection, of the success of a ragged school boy, of the stately misery of some dying millionaire, or the like (and such things continually pass under our notice, and if we will may be retained), will often gain the attention of a class which may then be turned to higher objects.

Need I add that our preparation should be prayerful. We read that our Saviour "in the day time taught in the Temple," and at night "He went up into a mountain to pray." If He needed thus to seek aid in his work, how much more do we!

The days of miraculous powers, and gifts of language and understanding, have long since passed, but we know not how the Almighty Creator of the mind may aid our efforts in the study of our lessons in answer to earnest prayer. We know that He will help us. Luther, that great teacher, left behind him this saying, "Bene orásse est bene studuisse,” “to have prayed well is to have studied well," and we know what vast results have flowed to the world from his teaching.

Dr. Watts, the father of infant psalmody, has well written on this point;-"Think with yourself how easily and how insensibly, by one turn of thought, the Father of light can lead you into a large series of useful ideas;

He can teach you to lay hold on a clue which may guide your thoughts through all the difficulties of an intricate subject. Think how easily the Author of your being can direct your motions by his Providence, so that the glance of an eye, or a word striking the ear, or a sudden turn of the fancy shall conduct you to a train of happy sentiments."

Let us now ask ourselves the question, why our lessons are not prepared better than they are? This may be

traced in most cases to one of these three things, - indolence and procrastination, putting off the duty, perhaps for some trifling reason, till the time is past; entering into too many engagements, which prevent our doing any of them as thoroughly as we ought; or want of interest in the work, arising from a want of appreciation of its solemn nature, its vast importance, its high dignity, and its great rewards. The first of these may be overcome and removed by steady determination, the last is at the root of most of our short comings. Against the second we need especially to guard in the present day. Which is the better, to do one thing well or completely, or to half do two things? I remember being much struck by an ordination sermon preached by Dr. Vaughan, of Harrow. After warning the candidates against the extreme desire to be at once useful, that restless impatience to be at work, so characteristic of the times, he said, "Be assured that of all employments, that is the most useful which is the equipment for usefulness ;" and again, after commenting on that excessive activity which too often leaves no place for meditation and thought, he added, "Want of repose is often as dangerous as want of energy, and is as injurious to real efficiency."

We have now many facilities in preparation, of which those who have taught before us were not possessed, and no doubt a good library of good books is a great assistance in prepara

tion; though, after all, I am not sure that a good reference Bible is not the best library for this purpose. It is almost astonishing how the truths of a passage come out, and are illustrated by comparing one portion of Scripture with another. The best aid of this kind is Bagster's Scripture Treasury, which is simply a reference Bible on a very enlarged scale, the references taking up, though in small type, the same space as the verses to which they refer.

The following books will, I think, be found generally useful in the preparation of Sunday school lessons, besides the books of notes on particular lessons and the various Sunday school periodicals.

Nicholls' Help to reading the Bible, and his work on the the Book of Proverbs. This last is specially useful in providing Scripture illustrations upon nearly every point treated of in the Bible.

The Scripture Treasury and Scripture Text Book, published by the Religious Tract and Book Society for Ireland, will be found most useful in dividing a lesson on any particular subject, and is in many other ways invaluable. For their price they are the most useful books a Sunday school teacher can possess himself of.

Matthew Henry's Commentary will be found most useful in the classification of a lesson, and as an aid to lucid arrangements, and suggesting the lessons to be drawn ; while Barnes' Notes are most useful in affording explanations of customs, &c.

In the preparation of lessons on the Liturgy, Bailey's "Liturgy compared with the Bible," published by the Christian Knowledge Society, will be found most useful in showing that our Prayer Book is thoroughly and entirely Scriptural; and Proctor on the Common Prayer, in explaining its history and the rationale of its various parts.

This list might be increased indefinitely; Angus' Bible Hand-book, Dean

Trench on the Miracles and Parables, Kitto's Biblical Illustrations, and many others might well claim our consideration, but those I have mentioned are those most generally useful, and most of them within the reach of the generality of teachers.

But let us now turn to the actual work of the preparation of a lesson.

The modes in which a lesson may be prepared may be described as private or solitary preparation, and public or social preparation. The former we will consider presently; the latter is of two varieties, which we may distinguish as ministerial and mutual. The first of these two is, I believe, by far the most usual; the latter, in my opinion, is generally the more useful. By ministerial class preparation I mean a meeting of the teachers, presided over by the clergyman at the head of the school, who conducts such a meeting in a manner very similar to a Bible class, and monopolizes the greater part of the conversation; the teachers occupying the position for the time being of scholars, and from their position receiving rather than interchanging information.

"We

The following description of a preparation class conducted on this principle has been given to me by a senior teacher in one of our schools. meet once a week, fadies and gentlemen together. The incumbent expounds the passage for the ensuing Sunday's lesson, explaining it critically, deducing the practical instruction to be gained from it, and suggesting illustrations or other modes of simplifying the text for the children. The meeting lasts an hour, and concludes (not commences) with prayer."

By mutual class preparation I mean a meeting of teachers in which the consideration of the lesson is a joint affair, each contributing according to his ability his mite to the common stock. With this mode of preparation I am the best acquainted, it having been

adopted for several years in the Parish Church boy's Sunday school with which I am connected. Our mode of proceeding is as follows:-We (or rather eight or nine of us, for some are unable to attend), meet at the house of our senior curate, who, when his engage ments allow, presides over our meetings. In his absence the superintendent occupies the chair. The curate, superintendent, and teachers, in the order of the classes, take it in turns to bring prepared notes of the appointed lesson. After prayer, the passage is read round, and then the teacher whose turn it is to lead reads his notes, with such comment as he thinks needful. The curate, superintendent, and teachers, then indiscriminately give their opinions on the proposed general outline; and suggest any modifications which seem to them advisable. Sometimes the outline is adopted without alteration, sometimes it is entirely altered; it being understood that the meeting is in no wise bound to adopt the suggested lesson. The outline being arranged, the teachers proceed to fill up the details, each supplying any proofs, explanations, or illustrations that may strike him. The suggestions of old and young teachers are alike considered and balanced. Each teacher takes down the agreed notes, and any teacher unavoidably absent is also furnished with a copy. The uniformity of teaching thus established is of great assistance, especially with regard to the catechising which follows the delivery of the lesson.

When and where to hold these preparation classes is a not unimportant subject. In these days of activity in all works of Christian usefulness, and, indeed, in many things which cannot be included under that name, it is often very difficult to find an evening which will suit a majority of the teachers, and next to impossible to find one which will suit all. The evening of meeting should, I think, be near the middle of

the week; not at the beginning, or the discussions and remarks (which form a valuable part of the meetings), will run a chance of slipping from the memory; nor on Saturday, else no time will be left for further enquiry or consideration, nor for quiet meditation on the personal application of the lesson, which cannot in general be fully entered into but in the recesses of each teacher's heart in his secret chamber.

Again, the hour of meeting is often a subject of some difficulty. If fixed early, probably some will not be able, from business engagements, to be present at the beginning; if late, then the evening is all consumed in the meeting, and no time left for any other engagement. As to the place of meeting, I suppose there is no school where the use of the class room or committee room would not be granted to the teachers for the purpose; if they can meet at the house of one of the clergy or of the superintendent so much the more comfortable. In either case it is well to have a small library of works specially useful in preparing the lessons at the place of meeting. This may easily be done if each teacher will lend a book or two to the common stock; if the school can afford to give a grant for the purpose so much the better.

The course we adopt in the Parish Church School on these points is as follows:-We meet on Thursday evenings. This leaves ample time for further consideration, and yet it is not far from Sunday. Our hour of meeting is at a quarter past six. This allows of most of the teachers getting home from the City, and getting tea before hand. The meeting lasts till a quarter or ten minutes to eight, thus allowing the teachers to get comfortably to any other engagement they may have at eight, at which hour our night school, the prayer meeting in the Memorial Hall, the Literary or Social Meetings of the Young Men's Society, and the Lectures of the Literary and Scientific Institution commence,

with one or more of which most of our teachers are connected. We thus get through two distinct works in one evening; a great thing in these times of multitudinous engagements. As to our place of meeting we assemble at the house of our senior curate, who is our spiritual head, and have the free use of his library when necessary, in addition to which several of the teachers bring with them works bearing on the subject of the lesson.

There is another class of preparation meetings adopted in some schools, which, however, I cannot praise. In these the teachers meet once a fortnight, and certain of them read notes which they have prepared of the several lessons for the next Sunday. Very little discussion follows. These seem to me to fail from attempting to grasp too much, and give little assistance beyond showing the different style in which lessons may be treated, which might probably be as well obtained from the perusal of the notes published in the Sunday School Periodicals without the formality of a meeting, the holding of which I consider an unnecessary waste of time unless some decided good follows.

Private or solitary preparation has many varieties, from that of the teacher who just runs his eye over the passage and thinks he knows how to treat it, to that of him who spends hours in its study and perceives a few of its difficulties. As a general rule it is impossible to prepare a lesson properly in less than two or three hours: teacher of some standing might do it perhaps in less, but he will probably, knowing by experience the importance of the duty, spend as much time on his lesson as his junior. The following will probably be found a useful mode of preparing a lesson in private:-Read through the passage carefully, making a note as you read of anything that strikes you, and of the principal lessons it seems designed to teach; then take a

Reference Bible, or still better, Bagster's Scripture Treasury, and turn up all the passages referred to. You will probably by that time have got a pretty fair idea of the general scope of the passage, and of the best mode of treat

:

ing it and will then be enabled to sketch out the plan of the lesson. That done, fill in such proofs and parallel passages as may seem useful, add illustrations, explanations of eastern customs, &c., and finally, having got together all your material, consider how you can best catechise this material into your class, and how most powerfully you may apply it to their individual wants and cases.

In a recent Number of the Sunday School Quarterly Magazine, the writer of a Paper on our subject gives an example of the manner in which he is accustomed to prepare his lessons, and which he affirms to work most admirably.

The following is an outline of his mode of proceeding :

First, note the places, the writer, the date, and the characters mentioned in the lesson.

Secondly, note the facts.

Thirdly, refer to the parallel passages and marginal renderings.

Fourthly, gather from books all the information possible respecting the places, writer, date, and characters.

Fifthly, turn to D'Oyly and Mant's, and to Matthew Henry's Commentaries (the former being the more expository, the latter the more practical), and extract all the fruit they offer.

Sixthly, arrange the whole lesson into divisions, and finally learn the lesson and the notes by heart.

One great point in preparing a lesson is to start with a clear and distinct arrangement. I believe that this tends much to keep the teacher to the point, and greatly aids the children's memories. For this no mode of preparation appears equal to the mutual plan. This too in theory should be the most fruitful in illustrations, but in practice

we have not found that it is. For the explanation of doctrinal difficulties probably the ministerial meetings are the most valuable, but these do not form a very prominent place in Sunday school teaching except in the case of the senior classes. The mutual classes seem to me most deficient in the personal ap. plication to the hearts of the scholars; this is a point which must depend on each individual teacher; external help can here give little assistance, whether from incumbent or fellow-teachers. For an experienced teacher, whose heart is thoroughly in his work, and who has had the advantage of a good education, possibly the plan of private preparation will be found the most advantageous, that is, looking only at himself and his own class. But for the general body of teachers, many of whom are always young and inexperienced, the mutual plan has many advantages, and the senior teachers will be willing to sacri fice a little of their own advantage for the common good.

The conclusion these various considerations will lead us to will probably be this, that preparation would be the most successful if carried out somewhat on the following plan: :

Let each teacher on Sunday evening, or Monday, inform himself what is the subject for the next Sunday's lesson, and read it through and give it some little attention, that he may so have it in his mind as to be able to think over it and look out for illustrations, &c., as opportunity offers during the whole week. Then on Wednesday or Thurs day evening let the teachers hold a mutual preparation class, if possible under the Presidency (but not under the leadership), of the incumbent or curate. On Saturday let each teacher look through his notes with special reference to the application. This may be regarded as rather a complicated course of proceeding, and as entailing the expenditure of a large amount of time and trouble; but surely, if our