Page images
PDF
EPUB

and would consider it useless, if not vexatious. In order to enjoy comfort, people must be taught what it means; but ages have passed over the cabins of the French peasantry, without leaving any impression but that of toil and wretchedness.'-From Education des Mères de Familles.

IT is well known that the fatal measure of 1829 was forced upon George IV. The following anecdote will shew in what estimation he held the most strenuous and uncompromising opponents of the bill. A few days after its passing, a privy council was held at St. James' Palace, at which the King presided. The reserve which, during the progress of the above measure through the House of Lords, had been noticed to exist between the Sovereign and his ministers, was, on the present occasion, exhibited in a much stronger and more unequivocal light. George IV. possessed the faculty which is commonly known as killing with a look.' The severity of his aspect upon this day was such as few could forget. After the official business was discussed, and as the several members were about to take their departure, the King, silently passing the rest, walked up to the Earl of Eldon, and grasping his hand, (a thing which he had never before been seen to do while surrounded by the circumstantial pomp of sovereignty), said, with evident emotion, Eldon, my old and tried friend, I am glad to see you by my side.' After this, coldly bowing to the ministers, the King withdrew.

[ocr errors]

THE HOUR THROWN AWAY.

'You are fond of music,' said a young lady as she sat down by my side, after I had finished singing one of the songs of Zion, and had resigned my seat to another of the party.,

Very much so, indeed,' was the answer that came from the bottom of my heart,' especially when applied to its best purposes.'

The young lady looked surprised, but instead of asking an explanation of the latter part of my sentence, she followed up her first question by another. And of course you like dancing?'

Now it happens that for several. reasons I do not like dancing, and the question being answered in the negative, produced another look of astonishment, and a more searching inquiry than the last.

'You don't think there is any harm in dancing?' 'Certainly not in the mere act,' was the reply. 'I think it a very pleasant amusement on a cold day, when one is prevented from taking other kinds of exercise, in which case I would class it with battledore and shuttlecock, and other games which assist to circulate the blood and warm the body; but I think there is harm in the usual accompaniments of dancing-I mean the meeting of a number of persons mutually vying with each other in the costliness of their dress and the frivolity of their conversation.'

More might have been said, but the enquirer

seemed tired of listening, and asked another ques

tion.

'Don't you like cards then?

I know nothing

more innocent than a game of cards for young people of an evening, when one wants to throw an hour away!'

:

Now I had done nothing to provoke an argument; but Miss J. seemed determined to bring on herself all this discussion, and on me all the contempt which she plainly thought my opinions deserved at the same time I felt that I was called on as a Christian, and having my Master's honour in my keeping, to give an answer firmly and meekly; and therefore I not only ventured to say that I knew of many things more innocent than cards, but earnestly added my sincere conviction that Christians have no right to 'throw an hour away,' inasmuch as their time, like every thing else, is not their own. Here a final interruption of our conversation took place, and I had no opportunity of resuming it. But although this simple circumstance happened many weeks ago, the recollection of it has been much in my mind since; sometimes recurring by way of stimulus, but most frequently by way of self-condemnation; for, oh! that I could feel I have never thrown an hour away,' since the evening when I was enabled to speak so decidedly of the sin of it to one who had not at that time been favoured with so clear a view of Christian responsibility as myself!

It would be equally impossible and unprofitable to enumerate the different modes of throwing an hour away,' that have been from time to time invented by the fashionable, the idle, or the formally religious portions of society. Those on whom time hangs most heavy can at least throw it away, if they

can do nothing else with it; and those who attain to their death-beds in this state of mind, will not have reason to regret that they were unable to throw away their hours in a sufficiently careless manner; but rather they will lament, perhaps in vain, for one of those precious portions of time which they have so heedlessly thrown away.'

[ocr errors]

But to such persons this paper is not addressed; and that simply because it is not supposed that they will open a book with the title which this little Magazine bears upon its neat yellow cover. I must not forget that I am writing for Christian ladies-for those who perhaps never attend the ball-room, the theatre, or the card-table. But surely we shall all agree that there are other ways of throwing an hour away,' which we may be all liable, through weakness of the flesh, or strength of temptation, or careless habits, to fall into.

The safest rule for the employment of time seems to be, to enter upon no occupation on which we cannot first ask the blessing of God; to engage in no study which has not a direct or indirect tendency to raise the mind above the mere grovellings of time and sense. I mean, besides strictly religious exercises, those which inform us of the dealings of God with the nations of the earth, as history; which lead us to study nature in as many of its parts as we have opportunities and the advantages of education given us, as drawing, botany, conchology, and those numerous beautiful studies which render a walk in the country or a visit to a museum so delightful and profitable. For all these things, while they produce exquisite pleasure to the cultivated mind, are doubly enjoyed by the Christian who looks through nature

[ocr errors]

up to nature's God,' and says of these various works, 'my Father made them all.' And this I would say particularly of that heart-lifting though oft-perverted science, the very idea of which calls to the mind hours of enjoyment (not, I trust, thrown away), which the knowledge and practice of music has been the means of affording, whether conveyed in the full tones of the solemn organ or in humbler instruments, where in the domestic circle it has been felt a privilege to join with heart and voice in songs of praise! Surely there are pleasures enough for the Christian without seeking those wild, time-killing, God-forgetting amusements, which seem to carry away the hearts of worldlings, because they drown the remembrance of death and eternity!

But while we pity, and pray for, and renounce that world that 'lieth in wickedness,' let us beware of those modes of throwing an hour away' which may not have occurred to some of us in their proper light. I know an instance, which proves the possibility of busy thought so completely engrossing the mind, that for the time it not only prevents the lifting up of the heart in prayer and praise, but even paralyzes the powers of the body; and the hands that ought to be engaged about some allotted employment either hang listlessly down, or perhaps the head rests heavily on them for a period of time, which it may be better not to define; thoughts of present difficulties, undue carefulness about worldly affairs, or airy castlebuildings respecting the future, have been in this instance confessed so to have occupied the mind capable of better things, that when at last the dreamer starts up from the reverie, a considerable portion of the time chalked out for the given employ

« PreviousContinue »