were in bonds-to pray for them, and in some way or other express their sympathy with them, and try, if possible, to relieve them. But I think our compassion is not to be confined to such. We are to remember those that are In bonds because of their crimes. For we have always a large number of such people in our gaols and prisons, thieves, and robbers, and riotous people. The late Albert Barnes said, that in his day in America, there were "not far from 10,000 confined in prison." And on making inquiry, I find that there are hundreds of thousands of people locked up in our prisons throughout England and Scotland! It is needful to send them there: it is a painful duty. But having sent them, we are not to forget them. We are to pray for them, and ask God to be pleased to bless their imprisonment to them. Yet, is it not true that we very much overlook them? We pray for soldiers, and sailors, and others; but we forget those poor prisoners in our gaols. Sometimes you pass by those high walls that shut them in from the world, and as you look up to their small windows with their iron bars, you feel a shudder passing through you, and you say-All these are bad people that are kept in there! But then, how often your feeling of sorrow or compassion ends there! And should that be? Ought we not to remember those poor prisoners; and praying for them, seek to cheer them, and help them on to a better life? One day at a railway station I saw a poor criminal with his hands manacled; and as he walked along between two policemen with his head hanging down, these words came up to my mind, "Remember them that are in bonds." And at once I began to think of John Howard, who spent so much of his time and substance in seeking to alleviate the sufferings of such people, and win them to the Saviour. And if you were to visit St. Paul's Cathedral in London, you would see a statue erected there to his memory, holding a key in his hand, and with the broken chains of prisoners at his feet. Some seem to think it is useless to try to do good to such as are in bonds. But that is not true. For there have been conversions in prison; and, as if to confirm this, a lady called at my house, the other day, to tell me how, in answer to prayer and through means of kindly dealing, a prisoner was led to yield himself up to the Saviour and lead a holy life. Thus it is not always a fruitless task to try to do good to criminals. There are others In the bonds of slavery. Up till lately there were three millions of slaves in America; men, women, and children, who were bought and sold like chattels, and bound to do whatever their master wished them. Now they are liberated, and very much through the influence of those that remembered them in prayer, and wrought to obtain their freedom. But there are still many throughout the world, in slavery. Read Dr. Livingstone, the great African explorer; and you will see how his heart was grieved at the "horrid cruelties" in connection with the buying and selling of slaves. He called it the "great open sore" of Africa, which we are called upon to try and get healed. Should not you and I try to extend a helping hand, to pray for them, and seek to send the blessed gospel to them, and bring about their year of jubilee? And there are others,-always a goodly number near our doors, who are In the bonds of affliction. They are so sick and helpless that they are quite unable to rise from their beds, or leave their rooms. Then what a number crowd our hospitals, men, women, and children, who are there through accident or acute disease; besides incurables, for whom there is no betterness on this side the grave. These are to be remembered-prayed for, visited, cheered and blessed, as they can be in many ways. And some have given us noble examples as to this, like Florence Nightingale, who has made this very much her life-work to care for the sick and dying; and Beatrice Clugston, who, by her energy and the ingenuity of kindness, has managed to provide convalescent homes for the invalid poor, and an incurable home for such as are beyond all medical skill. And how beautiful to see what other plans have been devised by which to benefit the sick poor,-as by little bouquets of flowers with Scripture texts attached, or by printing Gospel words on the coverlets of beds, or by enlivening the walls of the sick room with some of the Saviour's sayings; while there are others who find it their special duty to remember the blind, or the deaf and dumb, or (worst of all) such as are deprived of reason. Your life is not to be a selfish life. You are not to live merely for your own comfort, but for the comfort of others. You are to remember them that are in bonds, and seek to be useful to them. Because, supposing you were in a similar condition, wouldn't you like to be remembered? You know the "golden rule"-to do to others what you would like them to do to you. Besides, God intends that we should all feel and act as if we were all bound to one another, like travellers climbing up some Alpine steep. For in such a case, if one stumble or fall, all the rest are at hand and ready to help. And see how Jesus acted. Did He not remember them that were in bonds? Up in Heaven, surrounded by all the good angels, and by all the splendour and joys of the better land, how He remembered us in our low and lost estate, and how He came down to seek and save the lost! And should not we do the same? If we thus try to be useful to those who are in trouble, and do all from a right motive, then at last He will say—“ Come ye blessed of my Father, enter the kingdom prepared for you from the foundations of the world; for I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink; I was a stranger, and ye took me in; naked and ye clothed me; I was sick, and ye visited me; I was in prison, and ye came unto me. For inasmuch as ye have done it to one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto Me." He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. A Letter to Dear Children. ONOUR thy father and thy mother, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee; that thy days may be prolonged, and that it may go well with thee in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee (Deut. 5 16). Who spoke these words to you, dear children? Look at them again and again! They are God's own words; they are the first commandment with promise; they are for you. When you thus see how this commandment stands out amongst the solemn "shalt nots," should you not take it into your hearts at once, with thankfulness that the heavenly Father has thus sweetly remembered you, the little ones, by giving you a promise of infinite value? "The land which the Lord thy God giveth thee." Who can measure all that is meant in that? But this promise is conditional on your honouring your father and your mother. Most children in some way love their parents. But God's command signifies more than what you often thoughtlessly call love, more than simply feeling pleased with the parents who provide you so lovingly with all that you need, and who place their own happiness very much in you, the children whom God has given them. Honour (in God's command) implies consideration, respect, and obedience to your earthly parents, and through them, onwards to the Heavenly Father. Honour ennobles, consecrates love. I have often been much touched by the words which tell us that our blessed Lord, our Brother, our Example of human perfection, had Himself, while on earth, "to learn obedience by the things which He suffered." In this respect, He who came to teach had to learn. He could not, as God, acknowledge any duty of obedience; but when He "took upon him the form of a servant," He gave us an example of perfect obedience and honour, as a Son, towards the Father who sent Him. Honour implies trust. You have never been parents: but it is well for you to remember, that your parents have been children, and thereby are able to remember what is in the heart of a child. Trust them then, even when you may not yet be in a position to understand them. And pray for them (while praying especially for yourselves). If filial and reverential obedience should at any time seem to you difficult, think of that great Elder Brother, on whose obedience our salvation was conditioned; who was once so near to us in the flesh, and is ever near to us in the Spirit. He will assuredly be ready to help you. Do not murmur then; but with such a Saviour, such an example, and such a promise, ask and trust that you may have grace and help from above to obtain all that God has purposed "in the land that He giveth you." Postscript to Parents. DEAR PARENTS,-Does this commandment with promise not contain a double thread of signification? I love to think, that in it God binds the hearts of parents and children, as it were afresh, in one common humanity; hereby showing how dear is that humanity to Him. Whether will you, dear parents, help or hinder your children, in obtaining the goodly heritage conditionally promised? I do not ask you if you love your children. The voice of God, in its wonderful provision of parental love throughout all nature, is powerful-almost irresistible. Even the selfish, the immoral, the debased, are not often without some instinctive affection for their offspring. May a loving Heavenly Father Himself, in His pity, by ways that we know not, succour the unhappy children of such parents! But I would appeal to the outwardly well-conducted class of society, and even to those who profess to be raised to a higher spiritual place, and ask:-Have you thoughtfully and prayerfully considered how much responsibility God has laid on you, by placing in your hands this commandment, whereby you may help your children to secure the fulness of the promise? What do you show them, in your daily life and conversation, that they shall honour as well as love? Can they honour what is low, false, selfseeking of the earth, earthy? Would God have them honour what is not honourable in His sight? A difficult problem this; for it is God's own command to them. But, could He have given you a stronger natural stimulus, to induce you to set before them inwardly and outwardly (for you cannot seem, but must be what you seem), in your daily life and conversation such a parent, that to honour you, and to follow your example becomes a privilege as well as a duty,—the consecrated adornment of natural love? Parents, awake, I beseech you, to this voice of God, addressed to you in the fifth commandment, "Stir up the gift that is in you." God has placed it there, and you must give account of it. It is your special gift; do not think that a delegate will adequately supply what God has required of you personally. May God give you the grace to share the wondrous blessing with your children. The gift is God's; the command to stir it up is to you; and in giving the command, God offers you the means for its fulfilment. May you "so run, that you may obtain." M. W. C. First Watchwords for October. Week.-"Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh, shall of the flesh reap corrup tion; but he that soweth to the Spirit, shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting."-GAL. vi. 7, 8. Second Week.-"Ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise. For yet a little while, and He that shall come will come, and will not tarry."-HEB. x. 36, 37. Third Week.-"Whose fan is in His hand, and He will throughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire."-MAT. iii. 12. Fourth Week.-"Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them."-REV. xiv. 13. Correspondence. heavenly one. A dear child, who began the day as brightest of the bright among her fellows, was to be transplanted before its close (as we believe) to the heavenly throng. She loved her Saviour, and had begun the day in glad anticipations of its pleasures, yet also with thoughts of God and with reading of His word; but a sad fall, which took her young life, was a messenger to take and bring her to the Good Shepherd's arms, and place her rejoicing amid the throng of the redeemed ones. To the friends of the little ones it was indeed a bitter grief; but what a Sunday School Centenary Thoughts. voice of reminder to every one, "In the midst of life we are in The following thoughts, suggested by the great centenary commemoration of the introduction of Sunday Schools by Robert Raikes, held on the 30th of June last, have been sent us by a valued correspondent : The interest of this year of centenary commemoration has not expired with the festival day of June 30th. It would seem as though our land had agreed to extend through the years the memories which take their rise in the work of that humble and devoted follower of the Lord Jesus, Robert Raikes, that from it we may draw a great and lasting encouragement in patient labour for Christ's sake. A weighty, almost overpowering thought filled our mind as we gazed on the thronging masses of Sunday scholars assembled in the Crystal Palace. The sea of upturned faces, spread out before the eye, was a wondrous spectacle. And as all rose and stood, it brought to our minds with irresistible power those solemn words, "And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God." We thought of that vast assembly of "all nations and peoples;" and with it the tremendous query, where would each one of the company now before us, ourselves included, be found at the last great day? Every living soul among them would have passed away to the eternal state before another centenary should come round, and where-oh! where would their lot be fixed for joy or woe? The thought was almost too oppressive to be borne ! And now the swelling of glad voices in songs of faith, and hope, and rejoicing took our thoughts from the present scene to "the multitudes whom no man can number;" to the harpers, "harping with their harps," and celebrating the victory of those who had "overcome"-having "washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." In looking down upon the great mass of the company, the eye took in also the severed companies occupying the different galleries around; and in this, too, thought found its own symbol, and there rang through our minds that declaration of our Saviour's, weighted with the solemnities of a judgment-day, "And He shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats; and He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on His left." In pauses of the singing, we could not forbear naming these thoughts to some of the young people clustering round; and a heartfelt rejoinder from them proved that the attempt to draw some heart-lesson from the scene was not inopportune. It was a deeply touching fact that from out this throng of 42,000 Sunday scholars there was une chosen to be a link be tween the throng on earth, and the company above. The earthly festival was to send its representative to the never-ending Notices. 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