painter in portraits, from a designer in a variety of ways, at last he arrived at the extraordinary eminence and success of making the first practical efficient steam-vessel which could navigate so severe a river as the river Hudson. Now, I remember with pleasure standing upon the deck, with Robert Fulton, and dwelling with him on the subject. I remember asking him, "Do you think it will ever be of any good?" I recollect his countenance lighting up with indignation at the idea that any invention of his could fail of being useful. I remember very well, just as we approached the mouth of the Hudson, just as it abuts on the Atlantic Sea, saying "What will become of us if we drift out to sea? How is it possible that a vessel of this sort can stand the waves of the ocean?" Well, when I compare and bring together that day, with the fact of the steamers now crossing the Atlantic in eleven or twelve days, with a regularity and precision which is almost marvellous-why, how is it possible not to see and to be persuaded that there is not a man that lives, and comes within the arena of popular and scientific institutions like this, who has not opportunity given him of being distinguished by giving his talent, industry, and energy to whatever subject in the course of his investigations and inquiries the finger of Providence may point out to him? It is impossible to say, unless we be in relation to their own prosperity and to the ad- | and every opportunity he could gain in making vantage of the country. It may be a very familiar progress in some improvement; so that from a subject, but it is one which I do like to think of, and I will just allude to it. There was a young man who was the youngest of thirteen children, and his father a very poor man; and the best that his father could do for him was to apprentice him to a barber. In that humble class of public life, that respected individual demeaned himself honorably, as long as he chose to continue it. He then bestowed his care, and attention, and enterprise upon preparing the beautiful hair of our heads-improving it to that degree that it should be fit to make a wig of. In that he excelled also. Then, he betook himself to the improvement of a weed which I have seen-and which is little more than like a weed-I mean the cotton plant of Carolina. He betook himself to improve the manufacture of cloth made out of that weed. He gained great success, adding merely to the acquirements which he possessed-which you may suppose were very slender-the knowledge which he could pick up by associating with his fellowmen he gained that success which enabled him to decide the wars of the linen and the cotton, so that a vestment should be made all of cotton. That barber's apprentice, that honorable improver of our hair for the purpose of a wig, was Sir Richard Arkwright, afterwards high sheriff of his county, and who left his family half a million of money. Well, I only put that as one instance of a simple, plain man, honestly following the call of Provi-lieve that we have arrived at the acme and fulfildence, using the mind according as God's provi- ment of everything for the good of man-it is dence gave him the opportunity of drawing forth impossible not to think that we may be conferring its resources-throwing himself into the opening some great blessing upon our own country-that which was prepared for him, and thus gaining a we may, through the means of some individual in prosperity exceeded by no man in this country; the very humblest class, whose mind we may and I am sure that language is not equal to say touch, by just giving him a perception and an inthe advantage which our nation has received from tuition of some combination connected with scihis invention, enabling him thus to show the bene-ence and art-we may render him an instrument fit of the exercise of the mind, and talent, and of great good to his country and the world, and energy, and reflection, and desire for improve- a source of great happiness to himself."—Chamment in the humblest station of life. I will men- bers' Journal. tion another case, because I dwell upon it, I confess, with exceeding interest, from my personal acquaintance with the individual. It is no more than forty years since, in my travels in America, I came to New York, and I called upon the famous General Moreau, with whom I had the pleasure of being acquainted. He said to me, "Well, here's a strange thing! here's a ship to go by hot water! and to-morrow the trial is to be made, and I am invited to be of the party, and my friends. Will you go with me?" I accompanied General Moreau in the first steam-vessel that ever sailed upon the Hudson, in America, under the auspices of Mr. Fulton, the inventor-a man of a similar cast to Arkwright, perhaps with some greater advantages from his early education, but of a similar tone and cast of mind; unsatisfied with what he had done, and what he could do, and always thinking that he could do something better, and thankful for every information he received BALTIMORE CONFERENCE. The proposition of a conference composed of delegates from such Yearly Meetings as should unite in the measure, and the objects contemplated by the Yearly Meeting of New York with which it originated, were particularly noted in the Review, Vol. 1, page 623. As the time of this conference is nearly at hand, (viz. the 9th of next month,) it may, perhaps, be interesting to some of our readers to see the names of the Friends who now stand appointed to this interesting and responsible service, in consecutive order. It will be remembered that all the Yearly Meetings, except two, on the American continent, have united with Friends of New York, and appointed delegates accordingly. They are as follows. New York. Richard Mott, Thomas Willis, Henry Rountree, Richard Carpenter, Smith Upton, Wager Hull, William F. Mott, Paul Upton, Samuel F. Mott, James Brown, and James Congdon. New England.* Rowland Greene, John Osborne, John D. Lang, Stephen A. Chase, Samuel B. Tobey, David Buffum, John Meader, Samuel Taylor, Jr., and Samuel Boyce. Baltimore. Hugh Balderson, Richard H. Thomas, Samuel Worthington, Joseph King, Jr., Nathaniel C. Crenshaw, Jonah Sands, William A. Thomas, John Scott, Joel Cook, and Isaac Brooks. North Carolina. Aaron Stalker, Thomas Kennedy, James Peele, Richard Mendenhall, Nereus Mendenhall, and Joshua Stanley. Indiana. George Carter, Elijah Coffin, Henry Wilson, William Hobbs, Jacob Elliott, Eleazer Beales, Thomas Evans, Joseph Doan, and Joseph Cox. ber. THE BORDER LAND. I have been to a land, a Border Land, Where there was but a strange, dim light; Where shadows and dreams, in a spectral band Seem'd real to the aching sight. I scarce bethought me how there I came, Its morning and night were marked by the flight, But I saw from this land, this Border Land, With its mountain ridges hoar, EUROPE. By Steamer America-On the 5th inst. in the British House of Commons, a motion was That they looked across to a wond'rous strand, made by Joseph Hume for leave to bring in a bill A bright and unearthly shore. Then I turned me to Him, "the Crucified," In most humble faith and prayer, Who had ransom'd with blood my sinful sou!, For I thought He would call me there. Yet nay for awhile in the Border Land And so from the land, the Border Land, I have turned me to earth once more; But earth and its works were such trifles, scann'd I must think how empty they seem'd, and vain The Border Land hath depths and vales, 'was a land where earthly pride was naught, John Warren, since deceased, was one of the num extending the suffrage to all householders, and establishing vote by ballot, triennial Parliaments, and equal electoral districts. The motion was negatived, 268 to 82. During the debate, the Ministers intimated that a proposition for an extension of the suffrage would be presented by them at some future time. The Encumbered Estates Bill has passed the lower House. The Affirmation Bill, dispensing with oaths in giving evidence in courts of law, has also passed by 77 to 73, but its passage of the upper House is considered doubtful. A bill for the gov ernment of the Australasian colonies has been brought forward under the authority of the government. The present government of New South Wales, consisting of a governor and legislative the people, and one-third appointed by the crown, council, two-thirds of the latter being elected by is to be extended to the other provinces. The several colonies, having separate and distinct legislatures, will elect certain members to a General Assembly of the whole union, federated for certain general purposes, embracing the imposition of duties, the post office department, the erection of a supreme court, the regulation of weights and measures, &c. &c. The colonists have also the power of altering their constitution so as to establish two legislative chambers. An uniform tariff will be adopted, and trade between the several colonies will be entirely free, as among our own States. The whole will be presided over by a Governor General, appointed by the crown. The message of the President of France gives a lengthy exposition of the state of the country, show ing that though trade and business generally were recom diseases, and ten not ascertained; 23d, sixty from cholera, eighteen from other diseases; 25th, one hundred and twenty-four interments, eighty-four of cholera. St. Louis, for the week ending 17th, 439 cholera interments, 76 of other diseases. On the 20th, in nine out of twelve cemeteries, eighty-one cholera, 21st, from eleven cemeteries, 106 cholera, 24 others, 25th, eight cemeteries, 93 cholera, 16 others.. terments;-cholera asphyxia fourteen, do. infantum Philadelphia, from the 16th to the 23rd, 184 intwenty, do. morbus five, diarrhoea two; consumption fourteen. Cases of cholera 34. On the 21st, ten cases, on the 22nd and 24th, five each. On the 25th, 20 cases and eight deaths reported. On the 20th, 21st 22nd and 23rd, the thermometer in this city. at three P. M. stood at 94, 99, 100, and 97 degrees in the shade. CALIFORNIA.-The steamer Crescent City arrived at New Orleans on the 10th, in six days from Chagres. Among the passengers were Col. Hughes of the Topographical Engineers, and his party, who have been engaged in exploring and surveying different routes for a railroad across the Isthmus. They report having surveyed an excellent route, from Limon or Navy Bay to Panama, the whole distance of which, from ocean to ocean, is but fortysix miles, and the summit elevation only two hundred and seventy-five feet above the Pacific-the greatest grade on the Atlantic slope being twenty feet per mile, and on the Pacific side forty feet, with abundance of the finest timber and other ma. terial along the route. Limon Bay is said to be an excellent harbor, free from any bar, and having a sufficient depth of water for the largest vessels very near the shore. The steamer Panama, the third of the line, arrived at Panama on the 6th of Fifth month, in fifty-five days and seven hours running time from New York, and sailed for San Francisco on the 17th, with 300 passengers. The Oregon arrived on the 5th from San Francisco, and sailed again on the 23d. The California arrived on the 21st, having left San Francisco on the 1st, and was to sail on the 15th inst. All the passengers at Panama had secured transportation to California The Crescent City brings about half a million of dollars The Prussian, Hanoverian, and Saxon deputies at in gold dust and specie, on freight, and the passen-. Berlin have proposed another German constitution.gers about an equal amount in dust. The former The King of Prussia is to be Protector of the Em-accounts of the abundance of gold in California are pire, and there is to be a Senate and House of Rep- fully confirmed. Digging had been mostly susresentatives. The Senate is to consist of 167 mem-pended during the winter, in consequence of the bers, half appointed by the Government and half by the Legislature of each State. The representatives will be elected; every free citizen, unconvicted of crime, and twenty-five years of age, to be an elector; and every one eligible to be a representative who has been three years a citizen, and who is thirty years of age. It remains to be seen how many Governments will accept this constitution. The cholera has increased in Paris. On the 3d inst. 119 deaths took place in the hospitals. snow, and since the opening of spring high water has interfered with operations in the streams. San Francisco was crowded with immigrants, and habitations being very scarce in comparison with the demand, all kinds of buildings, even mere huts or sheds, commanded enormous rents. Provisions were also scarce and dear. Upwards of fifty deserted vessels were lying at San Francisco. The immigrants were leaving for the mines as fast as possible. It is asserted that three to four ounces of gold per man was considered a common day's work in the mining districts. At Sacramento City, it is said that oxen bring $200 per yoke, flour $30 per barrel, dried beef $75 per cwt., and board, excluCHOLERA. In New York, on the 19th, ten deaths sive of lodging, $20 per week. The people of Calireported; since which the disease has increased.fornia had as yet established no Government. They On the 24th, twenty-one deaths: 25th, twenty five were anxiously awaiting news of the action of Condeaths. Cincinnati, 18th, fifty-nine cholera inter-gress upon the subject, not having heard of the failments, 21st, twenty six of cholera, twenty of other ure of that body to act upon it. The Hungarians have defeated an Austrian force in south eastern Hungary, and driven it into Wallachia. They were also besieging Temeswar. The whole Hungarian force now in the field is stated at 400,000 men. upon it, nor unduly discouraged where it may not be found. We believe that many secking minds among the different denominations of Christians, whose eyes have been partially opened to the corruptions in the professing church of Christ, and who have Price two dollars per annum, payable in advance, or been led to desire their removal, are still but very six copies for ten dollars. This paper is subject to newspaper postage only. Epistle from the Yearly Meeting held in London, by adjournments, from the 23d of the Fifth month, to the 1st of the Sixth month, inclusive, 1849; to the Quarterly and Monthly Meetings of Friends in Great Britain, Ireland and elsewhere. DEAR FRIENDS:-Through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, we have, in this, our annual assembly, been favoured, from time to time, with a sense of the holy presence whilst transacting the weighty affairs in which we have been engaged. In the reverent acknowledgment of this, his unmerited mercy, we salute you, our dear absent friends, and bid you also be of good cheer, and put your trust in the name of the Lord. It was the language of the Most High through his prophet of old, "They shall not be ashamed that wait for me." It is cause of heartfelt thankfulness, that as a religious society, we have been led to a practical appreciation of the blessedness of a lowly, reverent waiting upon God, and to a belief in the immediate teaching of his Holy Spirit. This is the ground of our testimony to the nature of spiritual worship, and to the source and authority of gospel ministry. May we all be true to our profession: may each, in a concern for the good of his own soul, and for the welfare of his brethren, seek to draw nigh unto God in spirit; reverently to feel after Him who is not far from every one of us. To those who unite together to worship God after this sort, in humble dependance on the help of his Holy Spirit, He graciously condescends to make Himself known for their refreshment and strength, however small may be their numbers. Were these high privileges adequately appreciated, the attendance of all our religious meetings would be felt by us not only as a duty, but often even as a delight; and whilst highly estimating the blessing of a living gospel ministry, where the Lord may be pleased to confer this gift, we should not be dependant imperfectly alive to the truth, that human intervention is not essential to the public worship of God. Under the idea that it is in vain to assemble for this purpose without a preacher, the character of Christ as the ever present head and all-sufficient helper of his own church, is not fully recognized; living member, is but imperfectly felt, and the the individual part which appertains to cach blessed Apostolical doctrine of the manifestation of the Spirit given to every man to profit withal, and the consequent distribution of gifts to the different members of the body for the edifying of the whole in love, are to a large extent virtually lost sight of or denied. How important, then, is it that the testimony which the Lord has given us to bear in reference to these things, should be consistently maintained in the life and power of the gospel; that others beholding their practical excellence, may be thereby brought to the full acknowledgment of the Truth. It was a remarkable characteristic of the gospel labours of those who were raised up by the power of the Lord, and rendered instrumental to the revival of primitive christianity in the gathering of our religious Society, that they sought to bring their hearers off from all dependance upon man. They bore testimony to Christ as their Redeemer and Mediator, as their Prophet, Priest and King. He was their refuge, their hope, and their only dependance; and in his love, they sought to bring others to a holy settlement upon Him, the one true foundation, and to leave them there. Building on this foundation, their work stood; and it was a work which the Lord owned in the large diffusion of the Truth in doctrine and practice through their means in the earth. They had no new truths to deliver, but it was their honest concern to bring men to the fulness of the truths declared by our Lord and his apostles, and to the living experience of them. We believe these truths and this experience to be the unchangeable heritage of the Lord's people to the end of time. It is a blessed thing to have the heart truly converted to God, and thereby to have a part in, that covenant of light, life and love which He hath made with his people through Him who died for them. But after the beginning of the work of grace has been known, many are the conflicts of the Christian's warfare a warfare in which "the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh." Yet to those who, putting their trust in the Captain of their salvation, give not up the conflict, He imparts a faith and a strength whereby they are led on from victory to victory; and He at times cheers them with the hope of the crown which will never fade away. O! that we had every one of us maintained this warfare, that we had never grown cold in our love to Christ; that the earthly mind and the worldly mind had never found place within us and amongst us. How abundant might then have been the fruit upon our branches to the praise of God's holy name! It may be that there are those who, after having known the Lord and the preciousness of his truth, have been suffering year to pass away after year, in which, through unwatchfulness, or the love of other things, they have, to a great degree, ceased bearing fruit. Awful is the thought of opportunities of usefulness unimproved, of the seasons in which the great and good Husbandman may have been seeking fruit and finding none; but such is the sense that we have of the tenderness of our Saviour's love, and of his gracious intercession with the Father, that we cannot doubt that even for such, there is hope. It is true they cannot recover the strength of their days to devote them to the service of the Lord; but He is able and willing to revive his work in the midst of the years; if they return unto Him, He will return unto them, and not only brighten their evening, but cause them to bring forth fruit in old age. That which quickens and keeps the soul alive unto God, and by which we are made fruitful to his praise, must come from Him. We thankfully acknowledge that from age to age, the promise of our Lord to his disciples has been fulfilled in the experience of his people, even that the Father would send them another Comforter, who should abide with them for ever. "When He, the Spirit of truth, is come," said Christ, "He will guide you into all truth." The Holy Spirit controls and purifies the affections; those in whom it is suffered to work hate evil; and through its sanctifying power man is fitted, in infinite condescension, to become the temple of the living God. The church of Christ is spoken of, in Apostolic times, as a spiritual house composed of lively stones, a temple in which the Lord reveals his power and glory. The lively stones are they who are brought nigh unto God by faith in his dear Son, and, through the power of the Holy Spirit, fashioned and made meet to occupy their appointed place in that building, of which Christ is the foundation and the chief corner stone. As they abide in Him, whatever be their circumstances, whatever the infirmities of their nature, whether their talents or endowments be small or large, they all have their part in the building; and He who appoints them their place will give them their capacity for usefulness in his church. Earnestly, therefore, do we desire that all our dear friends, and those especially to whom the present may be a day of much discouragement, in the consideration of the smallness of their numbers in their respective neighbourhoods, and of their many outward disadvantages, may, in simple dependance upon the help of their Lord, come forward and take their right place in his house and family. We have often had to remind our friends of the duties of plainness and moderation in reference to dress. Without any diminution of interest on this point, we feel it right at the present time to advert more particularly to those duties with relation to the furniture of our houses and our general manner of living. We are apprehensive that a degree of display, of luxury and of selfindulgence, has crept in amongst us, tending not only to gratify the vain mind, but more or less to benumb the spiritual faculties: and the effect is often not less injurious upon the children of those who, in these particulars, are departing from our testimonies. We fear also that some, who are in moderate or even in limited circumstances, being led away by a desire to imitate those whose means are more ample, have been induced to set out in life on a scale of expenditure unsuited to their income, and have thereby been led into a course which has ended in ruin; and where this may not have been the result, their time, their strength and their hearts have, in consequence of the efforts to meet such expenditure, been absorbed by the pursuits of business to a degree detrimental to their religious growth, and to their usefulness in the church. We feel at the same time a concern that, whilst restrained from a vain, a self-indulgent, or an imprudent expenditure on themselves and their families, our dear friends may be preserved from parsimony and the snare of accumulating property, to their own and their children's hurt. Rather let them regard the larger means which the self-restraint we have recommended would leave at their disposal, as adding to their stewardship for the alleviation of poverty and wretchedness, and for the good of their neighbour. Our several Quarterly and other Meetings have in usual course forwarded to us accounts of the sufferings of our members in support of our testimony against ecclesiastical demands. The amount thus reported, including the costs and charges of distraint, is upwards of Ten Thousand Pounds. We feel the value of this our ancient testimony to the freeness of gospel ministry and to the supremacy of Christ in his church; and we afresh desire that all our dear friends may be concerned to uphold it in integrity, consistency and faithfulness, yet with all Christian meekness. |