structive, that we feel great pleasure in transferring it to our pages. Our brethren of the United States, though destitute of the advantage in their federal capacity of a church establishment, yet enjoy, in some of the older States, the remains of excellent public religious institutions; and one relic of the old times of the pilgrim Fathers, and their godly successors, is the not unfrequent recognition and acknowledgment of the providence and protection of God, in national concerns, by the appointment of days of spiritual rejoicing or humiliation. In our own highly-favoured country, we have not had a day of special thanksgiving during the memory of the young people of the land, though many and great have been our mercies; nor have we publicly set apart a day for fasting and supplication for many years, except once during the alarm at the time of the cholera ; notwithstanding that our national offences would oftentimes have rendered such a solemnity eminently appropriate.

Let us hope that the national gratitude for the providential deliverance of our beloved Queen, as it has been the means of reviving this pious observance, will prevent it again sinking into oblivion. We hail it as a return to the pious usages of former days; and trust that it will lead to a more frequent special commemoration of public mercies, and humiliation under national trials. [This was written when a special day was expected to be set apart.]

The following is the American proclamation alluded to :—

"By his Excellency, William W. Ellsworth, Governor of the state of

Connecticut.

"God in his universal providence presides over the affairs of men. The vastness and fitness of the works of God, as well as the endowments and dignity of man, declare the divine knowledge, power, and perfection, while the clearer light of Revelation shows that God conducts his government with infinite wisdom and benevolence. Nations and states, families and individuals, in all their progress and changes, are embraced in his comprehensive and sovereign purposes. It becomes us, as the creatures of his power, to bow before the Creator whom we acknowledge to propitiate his favour-own his rightful authority, and unreservedly commit to him our dearest interests.

"In such a frame of mind let us review the year now drawing to a close, and endeavour to estimate the blessings, spiritual and temporal, which it has brought for our enjoyment, that we may delight to come up, after the manner of our fathers, with united praise and thanksgiving, to pay the homage of adoring and grateful hearts to Him who was our fathers' covenant and faithful God.

"In perpetuation of a revered custom of the people of this State, I do appoint Thursday, the twenty-eighth day of November next, to be observed as a day of thanksgiving and prayer. And I invite the people of this State on said day to cease from their accustomed pursuits; to assemble with their religious teachers in their usual places of public worship, and there, with elevated affections and joyful praise, render acknowledgments to the Author of our being and our blessings, especially to thank Him for having endowed us with intellectual and moral powers, and opened to our view, through the atonement and revelation of his Son, a destiny of enduring felicity beyond the grave; also, that in our day, light and knowledge are spreading so triumphantly through the nations of the earth, and the oppression of government gradually yielding to the philanthropic influence of Christian truth; that to our own nation he has given a constitution of free principles and equitable laws-security to property-the enjoyment of civil and religious privileges-that education, science, the arts, manufactures, commerce, and agriculture, are generally prospered, and above all, for the fruitfulness and plenty of the passing year.

Let us also supplicate God that he would defend and preserve this nation; impart a reverence for truth, justice, and true liberty, and an abhorrence of falsehood, selfishness, and restless ambition; that he would bind these states in closer union-give harmony to the general and state governments-cast light upon the

paths of our rulers-impart to the people a due sense of the value of our institutions, and open their eyes to the peculiar dangers which threaten them-that he would cause sectional and party prejudice to yield to enlarged views of the general good-local jealousy and self-aggrandizement to be extinguished in true and generous patriotism—that he would put an end to intemperance, bondage, infidelity and crime, which tend to undermine our social fabric, and are exposing us to the judgments of a righteous God-that he would encourage and give success to every benevolent and Christian enterprise at home and abroad-continue to diffuse knowledge and truth, and still extend to this land the blessings of abundant harvests, health, peace, order, the security of the law, and the best gifts of education and religious instruction; so that we may happily fulfil the destiny and enjoy the invaluable privileges of an enlightened, prosperous, and Christian people.

"Given under my hand and the seal of said State, at Hartford, this eighth day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and thirty-nine, and of the Independence of the United States, the sixty-fourth.

"WM. W. ELLSWORTH."

PRACTICAL REMEDY FOR DEFECT OF PASTORAL VISITING. To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

I WOULD suggest to C. S. in your last Number, that Laymen who so much regret that the Clergy do not sufficiently visit them at their own homes, have the remedy, in great measure, in their own hands. Let, for example, C. S. subscribe £20 or £30 per annum, (less than his baker or butcher's bill would amount to) and prevail on a few friends, equally anxious with himself for Pastoral Visitation, to do likewise. Let him then call on the Rector of the parish-and show him that a suitable maintenance is provided for an additional Clergyman, and doubtless he will joyfully appoint one. Till the Laity show more anxiety of this description for their own supply of spiritual instruction, I confess, Sir, that their complaints-that in the present awful lack of Clergy (a lack which they have it in their power at once to supply) they are not sufficiently attended to-their complaints, I say, with me at least, go for very little.

Your constant reader,

J. H. W.

REVIEW OF NEW PUBLICATIONS.

THE CORRESPONDENCE OF WILLIAM WILBERFORCE. The Correspondence of William Wilberforce, edited by his Sons R. J. WILBERFORCE, M.A., Vicar of East Farleigh, late Fellow of Oriel College, and S. WILBERFORCE, M.A., Archdeacon of Surrey, Rector of Brightstone. 2 Vols. 1840.

WE rise from the perusal of these ment. The Correspondence forms volumes with a full persuasion a befitting sequel to the Life; and that in no way can we consult so the Life is so fresh in memory, much the interest or edification of that we need no other introducour readers, as offering extracts tion to the correspondence. We from them as largely as our limits are presented with a great numpermit, with little of note or com- ber of letters from Mr. Wilber

force himself, and from many of
the most eminent men of his age
-statesmen, divines, and philan-
thropists, of all shades and va-
rieties; their varied compositions
assuming a character of unity,from
the constant presence of the hero
of the piece, whose urbanity, be-
nevolence, piety, and delightful
vein of epistolary address, give
unceasing interest and animation
to the whole range of corres-
pondence. Whether writing to
Mr. Pitt or John Newton, to Lord
Grenville or to a Yorkshire yeo-
man, on a question of state or a
domestic incident, in joy or in
sorrow, but most in his letters
to his bosom friends-to Thorn-
ton, to Stephen, to Hey, to Ma-
caulay, to Babington, to H. More
-and to members of his family,
a sister, a dependant relative, a
child, there is throughout so much
both of intellect and feeling, such
a spirit of amiableness and warm-
heartedness, such a wish to impart
pleasure and profit, such love to
God and man, in short, some-
thing so thoroughly Wilberforcian,
that the reader must love and
venerate the writer, even if he
had never before heard of his
name-and how much more when
memory recalls the many endear-
ing associations connected with it.
The letters also of many of his
correspondents are highly interest-
ing, either from the celebrity of the
writers, or the subject of their com-
munications; or both. There are
of course, in the mass, many that
lead to nothing; and familiar
letters are not to be scanned as if
they were prize essays; but in
most there is something worth
collecting, or at least that is
innocently recreating. But to
others belongs a higher value;
great moral and political questions
are touched upon; the secret
machinery of many public mea-
sures is unveiled; and above all
the letters of a directly religious

character, present many most beautiful and valuable remarks connected with "the life of God in the soul of man," and its beamings forth in the details of Christian practice. It is edifying to see Mr. Wilberforce himself so often thrusting aside the urgent worldly affairs which pressed upon him, to enjoy hallowed intercourse with a Christian friend; and even in the lighter epistles, a passing word or thought evinces, that religion was felt by him habitually to be the most momentous of human concerns.

;

The readers of the Christian Observer will find themselves among many old friends in glancing over these pages. Several of the letters allude to papers in our volumes Mr. and among Wilberforce's correspondents we find many whose pens have adorned our pages;--Hey, Richardson, Babington, Gray, Venn, Buchanan, Dean Milner, borne, Bowdler, Teignmouth, Macaulay, H. More, and not least Wilberforce himself:

Gis

"And all that round us blooms, is

blooming o'er the dead."

The first letter in the work is one from Mr. Pitt, with whom Mr. Wilberforce enjoyed a very intimate acquaintance-indeed an endeared friendship, which continued till Mr. Pitt's death, so far as was compatible with occasional differences in political opinion, the incessant occupation of both in their respective spheres of business, and the great stateman's coldness towards those highest concerns which to his friend

commu

were of the dearest interest. In
these letters Mr. Pitt is seen either
in his moments of relaxation and
social intercourse, or
nicating confidentially with his
friend on important public ques-
tions, especially the abolition of
the slave-trade; while Mr. Wil-
berforce, popularly known in his