perplexed, and remained a long time silent, the reader doing the same.

At length he said, “You certainly have beaten me, for I never before saw the two effects upon society; I now see that where the Christian builds up, the infidel is pulling down. I thank you; I shall think of what has passed this afternoon.”

The sequel was that he was fully persuaded in his own mind to give up all his infidel companions, and was led to follow the Lord Jesus Christ. But the change did not stop here. When first the reader called, he had to sit on an old, dirty chair, with a number of half-starved children sitting in their rags on the floor around him, neglected and uncared for ; now they have removed to a better home in a cleaner street. Within, all is cheerful and happy. The father, no longer faithless, delights in the company of his wife and children, all of whom are neatly dressed; and his chief happiness is to read and to speak to them of the things which belong to their everlasting peace. “Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his God."

IMPURE WATER.

A VESSEL filled with water and placed in a room where persons are present will, in a few hours, have absorbed nearly all the respired and perspired gases in the apartment, the air of which will have become purer, but the water utterly impure. The cooler the water, the greater is its capacity to contain these gases. A pint of water at the ordinary temperature may contain a large quantity of carbonic acid gas (a deadly poison to animal life), and very much ammonia. This absorbing capacity is nearly doubled by reducing the temperature of the water

Hence it fol

below thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit. lows, that water, kept in a room but a brief space of time, becumes utterly unfit for use. be pure, must be freshly drawn from spring. Impure water is equally as health as impure air.

All water, to the well or injurious to

SOME ACCOUNT OF CATHERINE RADDEN. CATHERINE RADDEN was born in Scotland, and had from her earliest years been blessed both with the means of learning to read the Bible, and of having a Bible to read. It pleased the Holy Spirit also to enlighten her mind. But Catherine had been the child of many prayers. In her Father's house, "the God of all the families of the earth" was daily worshipped "in spirit and in truth," both in secret, and in the family; and it was ever the desire of her parents, both by precept and example, to "bring up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord."

This family consisted of one son and two daughters; and the Lord blessed all the household as He did that of Obed-edom. Oh, happy family, on whom the spirit of grace and of supplication is poured! for prayer is the appointed means through which the soul obtains all the spiritual blessings treasured up for it in Christ Jesus. Reader, dost thou know the value of prayer? if not, examine thine heart whether thou hast ever prayed at all! You may have been saying prayers, as it is called, all your life, but yet know nothing of real prayer, or the prayer of faith which is from the Holy Spirit -prayer which is the breathing out of the soul to its Redeemer, and without which its spiritual life can no more be maintained than the natural life without the breathing of the outward air.

Catherine Radden had by nature a cheerful disposition, with that clear understanding so often to be found among the Scottish peasantry. The Bible, the treasure of believers, was her treasure. It has been said that afflictions are an interpreter to one half of the Bible, and they were so to her. She had waded deep in the sanctuary waters, and her enlarged views of the Word of God made her conversation equally delightful and edifying. God led his people about through the way of the Red Sea; and Catherine's journey was through a rugged wilderness world her afflictions, outward and inward, were many for the trial of her faith, but she found, as all the people of God will assuredly find, as thy days, so shall thy strength be" (Deut. xxxiii. 25). For the great Shepherd carries His lambs in the bosom of His love. He sits also as a refiner to watch His gold, that the fire may neither be too hot nor last too long. The hours passed by the sick-bed of Catherine were hours of much spiritual refreshment, as she recounted "all the way the Lord her God had led her to humble and to prove her, and to do her good at her latter end.” A chain of gold may be broken, but the separate links are gold still; SO are the precious words of a Christian's experience, however unconnected. Her husband occupied a small farm, the profits of which, added to the habits of industry and economy, taught Catherine by her excellent mother, supplied them with all the necessaries, and some of the comforts of life, for some years. But it was for a season only that Israel encamped by the refreshing wells of Elim : we read that they again took their journey into the wilderness. So the children of God cannot expect long tranquillity, "this is not their rest." God had

Son without sin; none without suffering; and,

less, throughout eternity we shall have to

thank Him for afflictions as our greatest blessings, next to redemption. The days of sorrow were now about to take hold of William and his family "as a wide breaking in of waters." It pleased his heavenly Father to lay him on a bed of sickness, from a paralytic seizure, which afterwards brought him to the grave. When a little recovered from his first attack "there came another messenger" from God, which threatened their little property with ruin and desolation: a disease swept off cattle of every description in the neighbourhood, and William's farm did not escape its ravages. Led by the Spirit of truth into all truth, the believer in Jesus knows that that word chance has no meaning; that the government of providence, as well as grace is upon His shoulder, and that not a sparrow can fall to the ground without His permission. William therefore saw written on all his temporal blessings, when given or taken away, "the hand of the Lord hath done this."

Early one morning he was called out of bed to see his last horse die : on returning to his cottage, his wife was sitting by the fire nursing her little boy. Worn with sickness, William's soul was cast down within him, and in stooping to caress the child he exclaimed, "Before very long you will see your father a beggar!" At hearing this, Catherine told us that though her own heart was overwhelmed, as she saw nothing but clouds and darkness round about them, yet she replied in a cheerful voice, "My child, a beggar! the cattle upon a thousand hills belong to our Father." 'Alas!" (she added), "little did I think, in the course of a month my child was to have no earthly father to claim." The days of William's earthly pilgrimage were numbered, and shortly afterwards his disembodied spirit was called to join that blessed company "who have come out

of great tribulation, and have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb."

When a vehement east-wind smites our gourd, and lays it low for a season, the voice of nature is apt to rise against the voice of faith but what the Lord said to His disciples when on earth, He says to all His disciples now, "I will send the Comforter." Oh, happy they, whose life, as Catherine's, "is hid with Christ in God;" who, in this her hour of need, proved a refuge from the storm, and as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land." Catherine now found that He Himself is to His people every relation He may take away-the Husband (Isa. liv. 5), the everlasting Father (Isa. ix. 6), the Brother born for adversity, the Friend that loveth at all times (Prov. xvii. 17), all these and much more.

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The morning on which the mortal remains of William were laid in the grave, the soul of Catherine was greatly "bowed down ;" and the blank without well corresponded with the blank within, as she looked around on her cottage and her four fatherless children! The many losses they had met with had left their farming affairs so behind, that the sesaon had far advanced, and not one field was broken up to prepare it for sowing. Certain ruin seemed to stare her in the face, and she knew not what course to

pursue. But it is written, "Call upon me in the day of trouble," and "be careful for nothing, but in every thing by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, make your requests known unto God." At the throne of grace, therefore, she spread all her troubles before Him who promises to "lead the blind by a way they know not," and besought Him that, if it were for His glory, the darkness might be made light before her. While engaged in prayer, the last verses of Habakkuk iii. were brought home with much power to her mind, she arose from her