we are not at liberty to indulge ourselves in fancies selected from that repository. Our communion service must speak for itself. If an ' oblation to God,' whether of bread and wine, or of the unbloody sacrifice,' had been intended, it would have been stated. We are not to guess, or surmise, or infer, intentions of which there is not an atom of direct evidence. Nor ought we to introduce, on our own individual private authority, religious acts,' or prayers, into a service like that of the holy communion; still less, when grounded, as this is, on a reading of that service which none of all the Bishops or Presbyters of the church, for three hundred years, were ever able to discover.

Nor does Mr. Edge's reason for thus improving, as he thinks, the church service, by performing it in a mode which neither its framers, nor, we venture to say, any other person ever dreamt of,—appear to us to possess the least validity. The first thing,' he says, which Christ is recorded to have done, after taking the elements into his hands, was, to give thanks to God. After His example the ancient disciples, in their "breaking of bread," always first offered up the bread and wine to God.' &c.

Now on this we remark:-1. Is there not a confusion made, by using the phrases "giving thanks" and “offering up," as synonymous? Does not every Christian give thanks, day by day, for the food he eats;-but does he call that, “offering up" his dinner to God?

The giving thanks mentioned in Matt. xxvi. 27 is not at all a peculiar or solitary instance, in our Lord's history. In John vi. we see him, in the midst of the five thousand in the wilderness, taking the loaves,

"and when he had given thanks, he distributed," &c. So, in Luke xxiv. 30, and in other places, we observe this to be his constant practice.

But does Mr. Edge mean to charge our Reformers with entirely forgetting, in their Communion Service, this ever-present duty? Can be overlook the repeated acts of thanks and praise which occur throughout the service? Or if not,-if he be not blind to these things, then where is the room or the necessity for his addition to the service,-his 'oblation,' and his silent prayer,' when placing the elements on the table?

With all kindness and respect, we would entreat him to beware. He has already entered on the dangerous path which leads to the "propitiatory sacrifice for the sins of the quick and the dead," and he will find it so hard, as to be almost impossible, to retain his present position; or to avoid proceeding onwards to all the abominations of the mass.-EDIT.]

THE banner of the world floats gaily in the sunshine, fanned by the breezes of pleasure and prosperity, which shew only the bright and flattering side of the standard. But when the dark clouds arise, then the wind changes, and the stormy gale, blowing from the opposite quarter, turns to view the dark side of that banner; and displays before the despairing eyes of the sinner, an inscription like that of Ezekiel's roll -“ lamentation, and mourning, and woe."-Rev. J. East.

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FRENCH PROTESTANTS.

No. III.

THE SMOKING FLAX.

It was a custom of the Moravian congregation of Hernhutt, in Germany, to compile annually a selection of texts for each day in the year; this text is called 'the word of the day,' and referred to, both in their public and private devotions. A point of union was thus adopted towards which the minds of the brethren were directed, from the burning shores of the West Indian Islands and the pleasant Gnaden-. thal, well named the Valley of Grace, to the frozen and desolate coasts of Greenland and Labrador. It cannot fail to be observed how greatly these 'words of the day' cheered and encouraged those of the ' united brethren,' to whose lot it had fallen to be stationed in the most dreary, hopeless, and unpromising spots. When the little band of missionaries left their native land, to form a Christian colony among the Greenland savages, the word of the day was Heb. xi. 1: when they cast anchor in the harbour of the wretched land, which was henceforth to be to them both country and home, the word of the day was Phil. iv. 7: and often, during the long years of trial and suffering which they endured, do we find

them looking back to the promise, whose light shone on the hour of their first landing.

It is thus, that in seasons of distress and perplexity, all Christian eyes should be turned towards those great promises which, whatever clouds may obscure the narrow horizon of our own days, gleam forth unchangingly, a stedfast light upon the sea of time, marking the entrance to that harbour of peace in which the church of Christ, in the futurity of days, shall assuredly find rest: when the stone that smote the image shall become a great mountain and fill the whole earth; when, from the rising of the sun until the going down of the same, the name of the Lord shall be great among the Gentiles. But besides the glorious promises which mark her final triumph, the church of Christ is encouraged and supported, in these her years of warfare, by many assurances of the love and protection of the Lord, during the times of depression and affliction. "A bruised reed shall he not break, the smoking flax shall he not quench,” seem words peculiarly applicable to that portion of the Christian church in France which, almost extinguished by the storm of persecution, and having long languished in obscurity, gives evident signs of once more shining forth as a "lamp that burneth in the light of salvation." May it grow brighter and brighter to the perfect day, until the Lord shall "send forth judgment unto victory."

'Nothing can be more desolate than the present state of the church in France,' says a writer at the close of the last century; on the side of the profession of godliness scarcely any appears; if there be any real Christianity remaining it is concealed.' 'Nor do we hear,' he continues, of any revivals,

now that every link of Popery is broken, and every man's bonds loosed. A few, indeed, sigh over the abominations, and in the south of France a cry is heard for the pure word of God; but the labourers are not found, or compelled to conceal themselves.' But notwithstanding this gloomy prospect there yet remained those who still cherished the remembrance of the piety of their ancestors, and many who still continued faithful to the truth. M. Vernier, who visited a place called Mirabel, between Saillans and Orreste, speaking of the reception he met with from the Maire says, 'He wished me to go to his house, where he as well as his family shewed me a great deal of kindness; he told me that formerly, in the days of persecution, the pastors were received and concealed by his family; he shewed me a large tumbler, on which were written these words 'I love God,' and the date of the year, being 1788, and which he informed me had been used by the pastors in the days of persecution, when administering the Lord's supper in desert places. He also shewed me a white embroidered linen cloth, more than a century old, which he said had been used to carry infants into the same desert places to be baptized.' Not longer than fifty years ago,' remarks Mr. Hartley, the Protestant religion was without toleration in France: though less active severity had been exercised under Louis XVI. than under his predecessors, I know not if even at that period a single Protestant temple was permitted by the government to exist. It was amidst rocks, and mountains, and forests, and beneath the temple of the sky that our Protestant brethren assembled together, to call on the name of our Redeemer! I myself have visited in the vicinity of

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