4. The opening of the description of the Millennium, in the sixth book of the Task, Oscenes surpassing fable, and yet true!" reminds me of a passage in one of Robert Hall's finest sermons, that on the Discouragements and Supports of the Christian Ministry: where, speaking of the Christian doctrine, he says: "The facts it exhibits, supported by clear and indubitable testimony, are more extraordinary than ever entered the mind of man in its wildest excursions, combining all the sobriety of truth, with more than the grandeur of fiction." p. 36, fourth edition. 5. The following lines, in the fine address to the Stars, Task, book V. (a similar address occurs in Young's Ninth Night) resemble a passage in Mallet's Excursion. one eternal NOW Shall be the only measure of our being." (In a translation from Horace be has, "Guard well the cheerful, happy Now.") See also Southey's Thalaba, book I. "Nor days, nor weeks, nor months, nor years are here, An everlasting Now of misery!" And Crabbe, in a powerful passage of his Sir Eustace Grey: "There was I fix'd, I know not how, Condemn'd for untold years to stray: Yet years were not-one dreadful Now Endur'd no chauge of night or day.” 7. "Res est sacra miser." Sen. 66 to a soul that ever felt the sting Of sorrow, sorrow is a sacred thing." Retirement. Cowper agreed with his friend Hurdis in his love for the works of creation. Now I steal along the woody lane, To hear thy song so various, gentle bird, Sweet queen of night, enchanting Philomel. I name thee not to give my feeble liue A grace else wanted, for I love thy song, And often have I stood to hear it sung, When the clear moon, with Cytherean smile, Emerging from an eastern cloud, has shot A look of pure benevolence and joy Into the heart of night. Yes, I have stood And mark'd thy varied note, and frequent pause, Thy brisk and melancholy mood, with soul surest means of inducing a habit of economy among the lower orders, improving their morals, and making them steady and useful members of society." Now, sir, 1 must acknowledge myself to have been both startled and distressed by this paragraph, as well as by one or two notices to the same effect, which I had before met with in that publication: and I cannot but think that you will deem the subject worthy of the timely notice of a Christian ob. server. I believe, sir, that I yield to none in a thorough conviction of the utility of Savings Banks, both in regard to the temporal comforts, and to the moral habits of that class of society for whose benefit they are intended. Yet it certainly appears to me to be wholly inconsistent with the due observance of "the Lord's day" to appropriate any portion of it to such a purpose. Must it not be acknowledged to be a merely secular engagement? Can it be pleaded that it is an act of charity, and as such comprehended under the apostolic precept in 1 Cor. xvi. 2? Surely, whatever may be the motive of the clergymen or others who receive the contributions (who can indeed hardly be influenced by any other principle than benevolence), on the part of the depositors it can be nothing more than an act of human policy, with a view to their own temporal interests. This plan is, indeed, spoken of as consisting in the simple and easy act of giving and receiving a small sum of money. But the process will be found, when we come to the detail of business, to be far from simple. Regular accounts of every sum deposited must be kept; receipts must be given; and the check-books adjusted or else there is an end of all accuracy, and consequently of all security. It is stated, that in one of these Sunday Banks no less than 411. had been deposited in forty-three Sundays. Can it be otherwise than an undue encroachment on those To the Editor of the Christian Observer. valuable moments, to have thus WITHOUT entering on the proper received, and accounted, and commencement of Daniel's 2400 acknowledged, upwards of nine years, I wish to bear testimony to pounds each Sunday, in the small the propriety with which your corcontributions of perhaps many respondent C. E. S. has placed the times that number of individuals? beginning of Cyrus's reign, over all It is probable that many of your Media and Persia, so much earlier clerical readers have found occa- than commentators on Scripture sion to remonstrate with some of have usually dated it.(p.634.) They their parishioners on the unchris- have been so much gratified by tian, but too common, practice of seeming coincidences, between paspaying the wages of their labourers sages in the book of Daniel, and on the Sunday morning. But with the Cyropædia, that they have adwhat consistency can a clergyman mitted the latter to be genuine adopt such a remonstrance, who history, without duly examining its himself appropriates a part of the claim to that character. The casame day to the receipt of a pornon of Ptolemy, the chronology of tion of those very wages? Does he Herodotus, (which, at that period, not appear, however unintention- relating to Media, Persia, Lydia, ally, to countenance and encourage Greece, and Egypt, is perfectly a system already too prevalent? consistent, and precisely agrees The labourer is compelled to re- with Scripture) the fragments of ceive his money at the time when Barosus, Megasthenes and Ctesias, he ought to be preparing for, if he is all concur in denying any such not already engaged in, the sacred prince to have reigned, as Xenoexercises of the day. He proceeds phon's Cyaxares the Second. Even from his master's pay-table to the the Persian legends, collected by shop, to purchase his loaf, or to Mirkhard, from traditions, whence pay his debt. Thence, we will Xenophon might borrow his idea hope, he hastens to the house of of a son of Astyages (called by the God;-but he must not forget to Persians Fraiborz) deny him ever carry the remainder of his wages to have reigned. I believe that I in his pocket, so that as soon as could easily demonstrate, if the the service is over he may hasten present occasion was suitable, that to the minister (for it is intimated the Darius of Daniel was no other that the minister is to be the re- than Astyages himself; for there ceiver, or at least the superintend- certainly was no other king of the ent,) that he may resume his secular Medes and Persians, at the time engagements, and lay up for future of Belshazzar's (that is, Evil-Merouse the money he has to spare. dach's) assassination. It is certain He obtains his receipt-book:- that Cyrus died A. C. 529; and that and which of the two, it may be he reigned over all Media and Perasked, is likely to prove the most sia about thirty years. He, as cernatural and fruitful topic of medi- tainly, dethroned Astyages; which, tation during the rest of the day; therefore, occured the year after the -the prayers he has offered, and latter(Darius the Mede)had succeedthe doctrines and precepts in which ed Belshazzar at Babylon; probably, he has been instructed at church; being invited by the conspirators, or the computation of the future because he was brother-in-law of advantages to himself and his Nebuchadnezzar. Neriglissar (one family, of which that receipt-book of the conspirators) then revolted is the pledge and the memorial? against Cyrus, who was prevented from taking the city of Babylon, till he had subjugated the whole 5 K J. II. CHRIST, OBSERV. No. 204. To the Editor of the Christian Observer. Nor have we; for though it may be occasionally true, that "Ridiculum acri Fortius et melius magnas secat res," yet it is by no means generally the case, especially on questions like the present. We wish, therefore, that we had not inserted the ingenious paper of a Devonshire Squire. We did not, however, perceive all the objections which existed to its insertion, until it was too late to countermand it. Cantabrigiensis must, however, be aware that the "pleasantry" of the Devonshire Squire was intended solely as an ironical representation of some of the arguments which have actually, and in print, been adduced by individuals in reply to the impugners of university discipline. Having thus incidentally been brought I will first state matter of fact, and then refer, briefly, to the charges adduced by these several writers. The provisions for university discipline are, I believe, in themselves sufficient. If they become insufficient through the negligence of those who undertake an office of which they do not intend to diswith the individuals, and not with charge the duties, the fault rests the University; and they must sit down at the end of their year of office with the unenviable reflection, that " qui non vetat peccare, cum possit, JUBET." The Proctors are annual officers: the University binds them by oath to the faithful discharge of their duty: if even one of the two violate his oath, what can the other do, comparatively, for the maintaining of that order and discipline which we de sire? Those whose experience qualifies them to speak on this point, will answer, that he must faint under the burden. But the number of students in the University has of late years been greatly on the increase; and it has been found that even two Proctors, supposing both to be faithful and active, are insufficient to enforce discipline and morality. To remedy this acknowledged deficiency, a Grace has passed the Senate for the appointment of two Pro-proctors, to be annually elected, to assist the Proctors in this part of their duty. The salary anuexed to this office is so trifling, that the only motive which can induce a forward, contrary to our usual custom, as mediators between our correspondents, we cannot pass by this occasion of congratulating both our readers and the University of Cambridge-which some of our correspondents may have handled with too little ceremony-upon what we understand is the improving state of affairs within her walls; and we trust that future writers on this subject will soon have little left to specify, but abuses which have been corrected, and faults which exist no more. EDITOR. member of the Senate to accept it must be, I conceive, a desire to benefit the University by a faithful and conscientious discharge of his laborious duties. Now for an ap peal to fact-it is with an honest pride I add, that as far as my observation has extended (and I have not been a careless observer), the remedy has been found adequate. I may challenge these gentlemen to come from the North and from the South, and examine for them selves: they will find our streets cleared of the nuisance complained of: they will find four officers, especially appointed for that purpose, active and zealous and persevering, not only in punishing vice when they discover it in public, but in searching out its secret recesses, and preventing the approach of young men to the habitations of iniquity; they will find likewise the other Masters of Arts not backward to exert the authority with which they are invested by their degree, in checking every instance of misconduct which comes under their notice. I do not say that every thing has yet been done which I myself could desire: but much has been done; and I think we deserve not all the reproach which has been cast upon us. I shall beg leave now to offer a few brief remarks on the points touched upon by your different correspondents: but you will readily pardon me if I consider one or two ill-na tured hints, such as the Boy knowing more already than many a Fellow of a college, &c. not entitled to a serious reply. I must claim for the University of Cambridge a right of having her merits tried by substantial evidence; she is not sunk so low as to deserve to be made a by-word of reproach among persons incompetent to estimate her real deserts. Believe me, sir, I am "more in sorrow than in anger," while I write this; nor do I, in my last expression, allude to the Westmoreland Yeoman himself, but to those who will take occasion, from what he has written, to traduce our University, and to pride themselves in their self-complacent ignorance. had First, then, Many of the young men are ledged without the college walls; but not, as has been asserted, "out of the reach of the observation or controul of their superiors." The Tutor or Proctor has the same authority to enter a young man's lodgings, as to enter his rooms in college: nay, there is in some sense a greater check over a student in a lodging house than in college rooms; because, if the landlord be a conscientious man (and such landlords there are), his very presence, his being a witness of any wrong proceedings, and the fear of his giving information, will operate as a restraint, to which there can be no corresponding check within the walls of the college. Now comes the objection to this statement: "I produced," says Clericus Eboracensis, "a letter which a friend at M lent me, from his son at college, telling him, as a good joke, that the mistress of his lodgings had asked him, that morning, (the new law had been promulgated on the preceding day,) at what hour of the night she should fix the time of his return home?" Indeed! Is it so? Is this the evidence by which our University is to be found guilty, and condemned ? Ἐν δὲ φάει xal theσov. At least kill us in the day-light: let it not be by dark insinuations, anonymous letters, unauthenticated narratives: let it not be by "poisoned arrows, which not only inflict a wound, but render it incurable." Who is this mistress of a lodging house? Let her name be given up, and I pledge myself (for though I write anonymously, you shall know my name, if necessary), that she shall be deprived of her licence to receive students as lodgers. Who is this son so infatuated as to relate it as "a good joke" to his own father? Who is this father so careless of the morals |