capital and labor adjusted with so generous an aspect towards the latter as they are here. In no other country are the multitudes of all sexes, ages and conditions, who live by the sweat of the brow, so well paid, so well clothed and fed, and so certain, by honest industry, to improve their circumstances. No other nation devotes to the working man so much legislation, allows him so much political power, or makes the same ample provision for him when overtaken by age or misfortune. This policy is equally enlightened as regards the prosperity of the State, and as beneficent towards its objects. We may refer with confidence te the legislative records of this Commonwealth to show that Pennsylvania has always regarded and treated the sons of toil within her borders, comprising in this designation mechanics, operatives, and laborers of every kind, as a mother treats her children. And it is because this sentiment throbs with such power in her breast, she has refused to do anything which might derogate from the just authority of the Christian Sabbath. For this day of rest, important as it is to all classes of society, is indispensable to the working man. It is the only day of the seven he can spend with his family. It recruits his exhausted frame; it places within his reach invaluable opportunities for self-culture and improvement; it supplies him with means and incentives to frugality, industry and integrity; it opens to him the only sources of comfort and hope which are really adequate and permanent. These are no trivial advantages, but there are others which must not be overlooked in this connection. Sunday is the great barrier which protects the laboring classes against the wiles of ambition and the encroachments of merciless cupidity. Neither king-craft nor priest-craft can long delude a people who make a true use of their Sundays. And no intelligent operative can be so blind as not to see, that if the rapacious money-making spirit of the age could have its way, it would compel him to work seven days instead of six. What, in fact, is the very proposal now before us? Should the prayer of these petitioners be granted, it would bear with cruel severity upon the persons employed by the passenger railway and omnibus companies. In the capacity of conductors, drivers, hostlers, ticket agents, switch tenders, and the like, they and their families must already number several thousand individuals in this Commonwealth, and this aggregate is constantly increasing. Those who are familiar with the service these men perform, are accustomed to think that it is already sufficiently rigorWhat would it become if they were compelled to spend Sunday also in the same way? Is it for the State, instead of throwing her parental ægis over this great company of her children, to break down the last dyke which protects them against the pitiless surges of avarice, and surrender them to its fatal embrace? Is it acting the part of the parent for her to say to them, You must relinquish to your employers even that day of rest, which the slaves on every southern plantation are allowed to call their own? We cannot think so. We believe the State has no moral right to become the oppressor of her own citizens. She certainly may not connive at the oppression of the weak by the strong; least of all, may she use, for these illegitimate ends, a day which is not hers to give away. ous. These considerations are too weighty to be disregarded, except upon grounds more conclusive than any thus far presented to the Committee. We can easily understand that numerous instances might occur in which the running of these public vehicles on Sunday would be a convenience to individuals and families. We can imagine circumstances in which the want of these would be felt as a hardship. But the wisdom and equity of a law must be tested, not by isolated cases, but by its general tendencies and fruits. And looking at the proposed enactment in this view-estimating the consequences that would be likely to follow, should a broad license be given to all the existing and future railway and omnibus companies of the State to prosecute their customary business on Sunday-we cannot doubt that the effect would be most injurious to the public morals. It would entice many from their homes into the haunts of dissipation. It would do much to assimilate our Sunday law to that of continental Europe-a change which no patriotic citizen could fail to regard as a great calamity. It would contribute to destroy that reverence for the Lord's day, which is not only one of the strong buttresses of the public morals, but as already intimated, one of the chief defences of the poor man's health and freedom against the insatiate greed of avarice. We have no idea that all these results would follow immediately. Enough that the tendency would be in this direction. The present is no time for sapping the foundations of morality amongst us. The decay of public virtue, and the increase of the spirit of faction, are the two great plague-spots upon the fair visage of the Republic, which fill every loyal heart with anxiety. To counter-work these evils is an object towards which education, religion, and legislation, may well direct their most vigorous efforts. It may at least be required at our hands, that if we do nothing to strengthen the cause of truth and virtue, we shall abstain from removing a single one of the pillars upon which it rests, and this we are virtually asked to do by the petitions before us. In concluding their report, the committee beg to repeat, that the views herein presented are in accordance with the ancient and hereditary legislation of Pennsylvania. If there be any innovators amongst us, they are not the friends of our 'Sunday Laws.' We stand where the immortal founder of our Commonwealth stood, and we may be excused from resisting any change in a policy which has borne the test of nearly two hundred years. In the 'GREAT LAW,' passed in the Assembly at Chester, soon after his first landing, December 12th, 1682, William Penn has recorded his estimation of the Sabbath as one of the main safeguards of civil and religious liberty. In the first article of this code, the design of which is declared to be, that God may have his due, Cæsar his due, and the people their due, so that the best and firmest foundation may be laid for the present and future happiness of both the government and people of this Province,' he thus ordains: To the end that looseness, irreligion, and atheism, may not creep in under the pretence of conscience in the Province, be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that according to the good example of the primitive Christians, and for the ease of the creation, every first day of the week, called the LORD'S DAY, the people shall abstain from their common toil and labor, that whether masters, parents, children, or servants, they may the better dispose themselves to read the scriptures of truth at home, or to frequent such meetings of religious worship abroad, as may best suit their respective persuasions.' (Hazard's Annals, 1609, 1582.) Since the abrogation of the Sunday Laws would be absolutely oppressive to a large mass of laboring people, would tend directly to the increase of vice, would be contrary to the known convictions of the patriot worthies of the past, and in contravention of all previous legislation, would be repugnant to the moral sensibilities of the great mass of the best citizens throughout the State, and directly in conflict with the statutes of Revelation, therefore we submit that the prayer of the petitioners should not be granted; and acordingly, be it Resolved, That the abrogation of the existing Sunday Laws would be unwise in itself, and vicious in its results, and the committee are hereby discharged from the further consideration of the subject." THE RECTOR'S CALL. "Good morning, Mrs. Minty!" observed the rector, as the door opened to his knock. The door seemed to have a surly way with it, and opened scarcely wide enough to let the rector in, although Mrs. Minty invited him to enter, and brushing some invisible dust from a chair with her apron, asked him to sit down. The rector saw at a glance that Mrs. Minty was not pleased, but he could not surmise what was the matter. He had accidentally heard that day of the sickness of her daughter, and at the first opportunity had called to see the young girl. Not seeming to notice the mother's manner, he said: "I hear that Miss Maria is sick." "Yes! and she might ha' died for all she's seen of you!" replied Mrs. Minty with an energy that almost shook the good rector out of his seat. The rector was a meek man, and overlooking the readiness of her reply, he asked: "How long has she been sick?" "Two weeks, and over," said the mother. "Have you had a physician?" inquired the rector. "Had a physician! What a question! Why, the girl has been almost dead! I wonder you got here before she was dead! Had a physician!" These last words Mrs. Minty fairly ground out between her teeth, with illsuppressed scorn. It now became evident that Mrs. Minty, on each day of her daughter's sickness, and the rector's delay in calling, had added to her wrath, and it had now reached a degree of intensity that suggested strategy or flight. The rector resolved to try the former first. "Ah! you have had a physician?" he observed, "How did he happen to call?" "How did he happen to call? Well, did any one ever hear such a question as that?" "Perhaps some one told him Miss Maria was sick; or, perhaps he was passing and dropped in," interjected the rector. 66 'Do you suppose I'd let my own daughter lie sick in the house and not send for the doctor!" fairly screeched Mrs. Minty. "Oh, you sent for him!" said the rector. "Do you think he'd come if we didn't send for him? How'd he know Maria was sick!" replied the mother looking at the rector as though she pitied his stupidity. "Do you always send for the physician when you want him?" asked the rector with provoking mildness. "Well, I declare!" exclaimed Mrs. Minty. "What do you ask such a question as that for?" "I did not know," said the rector, "but that as you expected the clergyman to find out as best he could that your daughter was sick, without sending for him, you might do the same with the physician." Something had gradually been dawning upon Mrs. Minty's mind, which the last words of the rector, uttered with inimitable good nature, re solved into a full intellectual surmise. Her severe face relaxed into a broad smile. "Oh, I see! I see!" she exclaimed. "I thought them was mighty queer questions. Well I had ought to ha' sent for you too, seeing as how I sent for the doctor. And you didn't know Maria was sick?" "No," observed the rector, "If I had I should certainly have called before this. I accidentally heard of her illness this morning for the first time." “Well, really, I hope you'll excuse me! Step this way, Maria's in the back room; she'll be all sorts of glad to see you ""'-St. John's Chronicle. THE WORLD'S DEBT TO CALVIN. THE world is indebted to the church for everything noblest and best in her free institutions. Freedom is under perpetual obligations to her. Enforcement of organic law must exist, whether in church, state or nation; otherwise, everything rushes to ruin in all society. It is the glory of the Calvinistic church, and not her reproach, that she "enforced" her denominational law in favor of Presbyterian "doctrine, order and worship," giving thereby to the nations their most precious inheritance. "By these," says Mr. Buckle," the dying spark of freedom was kindled into a blaze.' "To John Knox," says Froude, " England owes a debt for liberty it cannot pay." "Calvin's principles," says Henri," are immortal and immovable in both government and doctrine." "Thousands were debtor to him," says the judicious Hooker, "as touching divine knowledge, yet he to none but only to God-a founder of the French Church, incomparably the wisest it ever had since the hour it enjoyed him." "Geneva," says Montesquieu, "is the mother of modern republics, and should celebrate with festivity the day on which Calvin entered the city." "Calvin," says Bunsen, "spoke for all times and all men;" and in the language of Motley," Europe owes her political liberty to Calvinism." "The Institutes," says Guizot, are one of the noblest edifices ever erected by men." Bancroft declares that “Calvin, bowing to no patent of nobility, but that of the elect of God, made Geneva the impregnable fortress of popular liberty;" and adds that the very "first voice" raised for liberty in this land, both civil and religious, "came from Presbyterians," and that "he who will not honor the memory and influence of Calvin knows but little of the origin of American liberty." Is it in John Calvin we glory? God forbid; but in God we glory, who gave us John Calvin. What kind of an argument is it that would impeach all this glorious record as an "oppression of the conscience" through" sectarian law."-Foreign paper. 66 A PRAYER MEETING RECIPE.-We have had a great many, but we will get none too many good ones. Go to the meeting with a heart warmed with love to Christ and to Christian brethren. Carry a spirit of prayer with you from your closet, and then you will be sure to have it when you get there. Be ready and prompt to pray and speak, Backwardness and waiting throw a deathly chill over the meeting. Let not the meeting ordinarily exceed one hour. Let brevity be observed in all the services. Long prayers are apt to abound in vain repetitions, and prolonged remarks are often tedious. The model prayer given by our Lord and Saviour may be easily repeated in half a minute. The prayer of the publican comprises only six words, and still is very comprehensive. From three to five minutes 1 is usually long enough for any brother to occupy at one time in remarks and prayer. In the closest one may pray an hour or a whole night if he chooses, but in the social circle prayer should be short, specific and fervent. Keep the services free from all friction of unkind feelings and censorious remarks. Let attendance upon these meetings be regular and constant as possible. MISSIONARY INTELLIGENCE. FOREIGN. THE MISSIONARY'S FAREWELL. Written on the occasion of the departure of Revs. R. J. Dodds and J. Beattie, with their wives, as missionaries to Syria, Oct. 1856. The allusions are to Mr. Dodds. "Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house."-Gen. 12: 1. FAREWELL, Pennsylvania! thy plains and thy pines; Farewell to thy waters, thy mountains and mines; There first I loved Jesus, there bowed to his rod; The dust loved so dearly lies under thy sod. Farewell to my sisters! your long winter nights, Farewell, congregation, beloved in the Lord, May Jesus send on you, in copious showers, |