A WEEK IN PHILADELPHIA.

[Concluded.]

I WELL remember my impression when I first visited Fairmount some sixteen years ago. I was in Philadelphia over the Sabbath, attended morning service at Lombard Street Church, and in the afternoon, finding there were no churches open, I took a carriage with some dear friends, and visited Fairmount. For the first time I saw something approaching a Parisian sabbath. For some distance before the spot was reached, tables of refreshments gave a holiday look to the street; and when we arrived at our journey's end, what a multitude of people were seen! I found Fairmount a grand resort as it is and must be for the city folk. The view of the Schuylkill and the high grounds of Fairmount, is very beautiful as you approach them from the road leading to the Wire Bridge; passing over the bridge, on either side are fine water scenes, which, beheld in the sunset light of May, gleamed brightly, diversified by all sorts of water craft, and enlivened by the darting here and there of the gay boats. It is a little laborious to ascend the heights of Fairmount to view the great reservoirs, but the prospect is very fine, and it is well to examine the vast preparations needed to give to the city the sparkling fountain, and the easy access to unfailing resources for water within and without the home. It is a little singular that one item in the cost of these water works was $989 for whiskey. It is one matter of rejoicing in reference to the Cochituate (Boston) Water Works, that no intoxicating drinks were furnished to any of the workmen on the whole line of the works. This is but a contrast indicating the progress of attention to temperance principles.

Leaving Fairmount we hastened to the city, as the evening began to be dewy, passing on our way the singular combination of Catholic buildings facing on Schuylkill Street: First, is the Sisters of Charity dwelling--a handsome white marble front; next is the magnificent Cathedral VOL. XX.

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in progress a good thing to look upon as a symbol of a steady faith, building with perfect confidence that a future of growth and strength is yet before it; then next is the Jesuits College, recently enlarged, extending from street to street. These edifices are ingeniously located with a real Papist's cautiousness, for opposite to them on Schuylkill Street, is Logan Square, and opposite to the end of the buildings--the Jesuits Collegeis the Friends' Widow and Orphan Asylum, with its open grounds. The Cathedral progresses as money comes in, and probably many years will pass before it is completed. I thought the recent addition to the College of the Jesuits, was but a symbol of their increasing power; for no one who has watched the movements of the Papal Church of late years, can doubt the increase of determined and subtle effort to build up pow. er. For one, I do not fear the increase of Catholic dogmas in our country any more than I fear the dominion of a narrow Protestantism, which, while professing to uphold the right of private judgment and the sufficiency of the Scriptures, does really demand deference to the Church and its doctors, and subscriptions to creeds, as the guide to the right method of interpreting the Scriptures. Catholicism is not merely a relig ion but a polity, and this latter fact is the great thing to dread in reference to the spread of that hierarchy in our land. Even the narrowest High Churchman regards the Church as existing for the Individual; but Catholicism absorbs the individual in the Church.

Passing these buildings, we pursued our way through streets lined with splendid mansions, long blocks of residences faced with white marble, and here and there a private mansion that really seemed too imposing to be other than some public edifice. Once more the night came to me in a pleasant home, and sleep was as balmy as prayer was sincere.

The morning came with no signs that Nature was ever troubled with any form of rheumatism, but poor me was stiff and ill conditioned to enjoy the pleasant guidance of a good brother in