ANECDOTES OF SILENCED

MINISTERS.

317

supernatural means, where the natural are provided to their hands. I speak of that which is the result (as is very often the case) of natural and constitutional causes, and of a want of due care in regulating and controlling these.

Where melancholy ensues from a known moral cause, and is connected with an evil conscience, it is plain that the religious treatment must take the lead-and the more mildly and reasonably this is administered (so it be by a holy sincere good man') the more likely it is to succeed. The party may be considered as under the ministration of condemnation' already-the great point is, to get him heartily to second his Judge in the sentence, and condemn himself; not merely brood in discontent and sorrow over his case. This once effected, the consolations of the Gospel may be poured in to good purpose; and will do more than all outward helps.

But we see that it is the lot of some, with the utmost sincerity and tenderness of conscience, still to have to fight this battle with gloomy self (see No. XXXV, p. 270); in which the author remarks (though in our times it is, I hope, far less applicable) that few escape.

The Enemy of all good, taking advantage of a peculiar temperament, seems to make it his business to drive some religious persons to despondency, that he may then make use of their misconduct, or of any accident which may befal them, to the direct prejudice of Religion itself. We should be very careful, on this account as well as for the sufferer's sake, how we treat persons in this situation. It is plain that, instead of being shunned and despised, they should be often spoken to, in a mild and engaging manner, and treated as one would a beloved child under any outward distress; yet without intruding upon them beyond their ease and freedom.

I believe that not any inference can be fairly drawn, even from the worst results of religious despondency, against the most deeply serious views of religion itself. God is not pleased to work a miracle to satisfy our sense of what is expedient: he has provided means, both natural and spiritual, for the alleviation and cure of this disease, and if we neglect to apply them, and each of them in its place, we must suffer the consequences.

But viewing the case spiritually of what use (it may be asked) was this man's life, to himself or others? The question admits, I think, of a satisfactory reply. He was in the ministry of the word, and his peculiar experience (like John Bunyan's) most probably enabled him at seasons to be more than ordinarily useful in his public addresses, to those who could sympathise with him in that tried state of mind. Paul's thorn in the flesh (the messenger of the adversary to buffet him) was probably a strong and constant inward besetment, and (according to the Divine declaration, 2 Cor. xii, 9) answered this very purpose. And after all (where Patience has its perfect work) who shall say what benefit may not accrue to the Church at large, from the secret prayers and mental conflicts of such individuals. Milton says of the Majesty of heaven: Thousands at his bidding speed, posting o'er sea and land to do his will. They also serve who only stand and wait.' Much more, then, they who keep a post against the enemy! Ed.

ART. IV. - A Century of Russ Proverbs.

In the work of my Friend Dr. Pinkerton, already quoted in this number, he has inserted a pretty large specimen of the proverbs in use among the Russians, translated from a volume published at Petersburg in 1822; containing 5365 Russian proverbs, many of them taken from Scripture, and some from Greek and Latin authors. As it is now very unfashionable (whether very wise, or not, I will not determine) to take these grave saws' into our mouths, they have regained, I presume, somewhat of novelty—and the present generation may thank me for entertaining them with a few in this work. In which I shall be the more readily indulged by readers of my Friend's book, because the hundred proverbs which follow are wanting in his specimen. Ed.

1. A good soldier is not hired but chosen.

2. Mean fare is soon forgotten: evil treatment is remembered long. 3. They who forget forgive..

1.

A bad wife grows uglier-a good one prettier.

5. The young man boasts a deed and the old repents of it.

6. The first beggar gets the largest alms.

7. Live and learn-be it ever so long a turn.

8.

If thou see the high road, leave the bye road.
Where frost prevails, hunger assails.

10. Beat thy mujik with roubles [pay thy ploughman his wages.] 11. Fear not the dog that barks—beware of him that bites.

12.

A rainy summer?— The better autumn.

13. Aye, keep the house-but be sure go out to Church!

14. There is light in the hut? Well, it is lighter abroad.

15.

In Moscow the bells ring oftener than they dine.

16. Fish in troubled waters.

17. A good Landlord? A good house.

18. Every body loves truth, but not to tell it.

19. The mujik is a sack-you may put into him what you please. [Me prenez vous pour une cruche? La Fontaine.]

20. The mujik spins no flax and wears a shirt: his wife spins and has not a shift.

21. Any shoe for the barefoot.

22. Yon little fort safe on the hill, has not a crust, nor land to till. 23. The dream was frightful, but God is merciful.

24. The bashful turn red, where the shameless turn pale.

25. Sorrow avails nothing, when death is here already.

26. The prayer to God now will avail thee hereafter.

27. Tell thy dream when the thing has come to pass.

28. Out of empty dishes who can dine?

29. The Tzar may bid us go, but it is God who shews the way. 30. A good Abbot? Good monks.

31. The sick shun the grave; in health they posted towards it. 32. A large ship-deep water.

33. Sickness confers not grace.

34.

35.

36.

37.

38.

Be angry, but keep thy fists down!

A guest observes much, though he departs soon.

Prepare the sledge in summer, the carriage while it snows.
Swift as is the hart his death overtakes him.

Simplicity is worth a hundred of the Saints.

39. Where the Khan is, expect to find the horde. [The flock is near if the Shepherd appear.]

40.

41.

42.

43.

44.

45.

Wo unto us! We have not salt to our sweet pudding.
Honest poverty is beyond shew.

The snake in the grass; the deceiver in smooth words.
The bear sucks his paws and lives the winter through.
They sold the skin before they had killed the bear.
Much grass comes to little hay.

46. Youth flies like an eagle and reasons like a woodcock.
The New moon is not seen for a whole night.

47.

48.

49.

the dirt.

50.

51.

52.

53.

54.

His lips are wet from his nurse's breast.

You break your shins on what was laid to keep you out of

A mujik rich? Why, an Ox hath his horns!

Thou hast helped a friend? Expect help in thy turn.
The snows will melt the frost will go,

Then forth will come whate'er we sow.
Money says nothing but does much.
A man in health fears not his task.

55. The priest knows the peasants' good nature.
Make not a cunning man thy friend.

56.

57.

58.

The man would suffer for an age, rather than die now.
Better be in adversity than play the fool.

59. God hath wetted-he will dry it.

60.

61.

62.

Art thou blessed with health? Go work and get wealth.
Ten kopiks in the house before a hundred in the street.
Heaven is high, and to the Tzar it is far [a speech of the

reckless.]

63.

64.

65.

66.

Judge not others: look to thyself.

The fool teaches the fool, and both are void of instruction.
A bad escape, from the fire into the water!

Maid, ask a husband for life-but know thy man ere thou

take him!

67. To bear children is not to break twigs.

68.

Long as he lived, the good man died too soon.

69. Pay thy debts-thou wilt be all the merrier.

70. Your people steal and ours receive it. [How true of the purchase of prize goods in war!]

71.

Water to the wine -not wine to the water.

72. The Wolf changes his coat, not his nature.

73. They hung the thief, but were ruined by the costs.

74.

With the man out of work the house is half undone with the wife sick, quite

75. The husband drunk, the wife takes revenge on the crockery.

77.

76. The Miller is always in plenty-but it is of noise.
If the woman lose her head, what shall we do for bread?
78. My friend's water rather than my enemy's mead.
79. Poverty-not vice!

80. He was running from the wolf when the bear caught him. 81. The Falconer knows the wood.

82.

83.

84.

A ward is not a sparrow, to be let fly in a moment.
Sleep is death's brother.

You cannot put thanks in your pocket and spend them. 85. The face is ever outward.

86. There is not a fox but can shew a tail.

87. Better quarrel at once than be always hating. 88. Our two hands wash each other.

89. Cut and eat while thou seest the meat.

90. The smith made the tongs to save his fingers.

91. The alphabet is learning, though a child can repeat it.
92.
Without faith of what use is prayer ?

93. Money should be told, and corn meted.

94. 'Tis not cooks alone that use large knives.

95.

Do not every thing by faith; there is room also for discretion. 96. The smoke will not break thy bones. [True, says the poor drummer-boy, but the ball may!]

97.

You can't hang all the house on one pin.

98. You are not to measure the cloth by your own yard.

99. The horse is bad? Get off at once!

100. Expect not good corn from bad seed.

ART. V.-POETRY. Sonnet: On the imprisonment in France of John Bowring, Esq. 1823.

BOWRING, thy spirit felt the pangs
of power,
What time reluctant France her iron key,
Mov'd by despotic mandates, turn'd on thee
Sever'd from help and friends in Boulogne tower!
But tell me, now, what in that anxious hour
Gave force (more than of stone) to misery,
Gall'd more than fetters? It was tyranny-
The sense of might and wrong! For diet sour,
Watching and toil and the cold ground his bed,
With griefs unnumber'd more, in some good cause
Lab'ring maintained by freedom and just laws,
The Briton bears—nor droops his honest head:
But show the rack and his close thoughts require,
Then Patience, Heaven! Or all his soul's on fire!

Communications may be addressed, POST PAID, "For the Editor of the Yorkshireman," at the Printer's, Pontefract; at Longman and Co's, London; John Baines and Co's. Leeds; and W. Alexander's, York

CHARLES ELCOCK, PRINTER, PONTEFRACT.

ART. I.-Quaker Marriage Ceremony and Records.

(Continued from page 300.)

The subject of Marriage has ever been in the eyes of this Society a solemn and important one; and the Contract itself, an affair to be proceeded in with deliberation, and in the fear of the Lord ;'—not slighting the controul of parents, nor neglecting to take the advice of Friends.

Not only has the Society exercised a constant care, from its very origin, over the youth in this respect, but Parents themselves have been made responsible in their rights as members, to the body at large, for the due exercise of their trust in God's behalf. 'Parents [says the Yearly Meeting of 1722] who have children to dispose of in marriage are tenderly advised, not to make it their first or chief care to obtain for them large portions, or settlements of marriage; but rather be careful that their children be joined in marriage with persons of religious inclinations, suitable dispositions [and] temper, sobriety of manners and diligence in business (which are things essentially necessary to a comfortable life in a married state): and carefully to guard against all mixed marriages, and unequal yoking of their children [with others] therein: Printed Epistle.

By the term mixed marriage, I need scarcely explain to any reader conversant with the Society, the Yearly Meeting intended to denounce a union, in this closest of all relations, between such whose religious sentiments, and habits of life acquired by education (if not also their