From this affecting history we may learn the following lesson, viz., that we should cleave to our converted friends. We should do so, because their God is a precious God.

This is the case only to the believer in Christ. "Unto you," says the Apostle, "that believe, he is precious."

Before conversion, like all the unregenerate, they received “him as a root out of dry ground; there was no form nor comeliness in him that we should desire him. Now he is the chiefest among ten thousand and altogether lovely." This arises from the fact that they have found him a sin-pardoning God. He is precious because he has washed away our sins in his most precious blood. He is precious because he is a faithful God-faithful in the hour of temptation and in the hour of affliction. He is a refuge to all in trial and in want.

We should also cleave to our converted friends, because they are a happy people. Naomi was one of the peculiar people of Israel. She was a worshipper of the living and true God. God has a peculiar people still; they are those of whom the Psalmist speaks: "Blessed is the man whose transgression is forgiven." They are no longer under the curse-that curse which has made our world groan-that curse under which the lost soul shrinks, and which kindles the fires of perdition in the heart. God's people may be in poverty, they may be bereaved, yet they are happy. God dealeth with them as with sons; and when they reach heaven they will find that these winds of affliction have wafted them thither.

Another reason why we should cleave to our converted friends is, that they want us to go with them. Naomi was anxious for Ruth to go with her; not out of mere natural affection, but out of love to Israel's God. Moses wanted Hobab, his brother-in-law, to go with him. Jeremiah was anxious, in his day, that the Jews should go with him. Your Christian friends want you to go with them. They may not have the boldness to tell you so; but you may see it in the anxiety of their eyes. They are anxious you should come to the house of prayer. They pray for you in secret places.

One more reason why we should cleave to our converted friends, is the distressing thought of eternal separation. Little did Orpah think when she turned her back upon Naomi and Ruth that she was parting with them forever. And little do the wicked think now of that eternal separation that will take place between them and their Christian friends. The probability is that they lived together in infancy-that they played around the same palmtree-sat together in the same cottage, and wandered together over the same hills of Moab. Now they part forever. Remember, then, that when death comes you will be eternally separated. Cleave to your converted friends; seek an interest in the blood of Christ, then God's people shall be your people, and their God will be your God.

THE STARS./1

BY GEORGE D. PRENTICE.

THOSE burning stars! what are they? I have dreamed ·
That they were blossoms on the Tree of Life,

Or glory flung back from the outspread wings :
Of God's archangel-or that yon blue skies,
With all their gorgeous blazonry of gems,
Were a bright banner waving o'er the earth
From the fair wall of Heaven!-And I have sat
And drank their gushing glory, till I felt
Their flash electric trembling with the deep
And strong vibrations down the living wire
Of chainless passion-and my every pulse
Was beating high, as if a spring were there
To buoy me up where I might ever roam
'Mid the unfathomed vastness of the sky,
And dwell with those high stars, and see the light
Pouring down upon the blessed earth, like dew
From the bright urns of Naiads !

Beautiful stars!

What are ye? There is in my heart of hearts,
A fount, that heaves beneath you, like the deep
Beneath the glories of a midnight moon!
And list-your Eden tones are floating now
Around me like an element-so low,

So wildly beautiful, I almost dream
That ye are there the living harp of God,
O'er which the incense winds of Eden stray,
And wake such tones of mystic minstrelsy
As well might wander down to the dim world
To fashion dreams of Heaven!-Peal on-peal on,
Nature's high anthem!-for my life has caught
A portion of your purity and power,

And seems but as a sweet and glorious tone
Of wild star music?

Blessed, blessed things!

Ye are in Heaven and I on earth. My soul,

Even with the whirlwind's rush, can wander off
To your immortal realm, but it must fall
Like your ancient Pleiad from its height,
To dim its new clad glories in the dust!

The earth is beautiful-I love

Its wilderness of spring-flowers, its bright loads,
The majesty of mountains, and the dread

Magnificence of ocean-for they come

Like visions to my heart-but when I look

On yon unfading loveliness, I feel

Like a lost infant gazing on its home,

And weep to die, and come where you repose

Upon your boundless Heaven, like parted souls
On an eternity of blessedness.

HEAVEN lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy;

But he beholds the light, and whence it flows,
He sees it in his joy.

PECULIARITIES OF AUTHORS.

RACINE composed his verses while walking about, reciting them in a low voice. One day, when thus working at his play of Mithridates, in the Tuilleries Gardens, a crowd of workmen around him, attracted by his gestures, they took him to be a madman about to throw himself into the basin. On his return home from such walks he would write down scene by scene, at first in prose, and when he had thus written it out, he would exclaim, "My tragedy is done!" considering the dressing of the acts up in verse as a very small affair.

Maglia becchia, the learned librarian to the Duke of Tuscany, on the contrary, never stirred abroad, but lived amidst books and upon books. They were his bed, board and washing. He passed eight-and-forty years in their midst, only twice in the course of his life venturing beyond the walls of Florence; once to go two leagues off, and the other time three and a half leagues, by order of the Grand Duke. He was an extremely frugal man, living upon eggs and bread and water, in great moderation.

Luther, when studying, always had his dog lying at his feet; a dog he had brought from Watburg, and of which he was very fond. An ivory crucifix stood on the table before him, and the walls of his study were stuck round with caricatures of the pope. He worked at his desk for days together without going out; but when fatigued, and the ideas began to stagnate in his brain, he would take his flute or his guitar with him into the porch and there execute some musical fantasy, (for he was a skilful musician,) when the ideas would flow upon him as fresh as flowers after summer's rain. Music was his invariable solace at such time. Indeed, Luther did not hesitate to say that, after theology, music was the first of arts. "Music," said he, "is the art of the prophets; it is the only art which, like theology, can calm the agitation of the soul, and put the Devil to flight.' Next to music, if not before it, Luther loved children and flowers. The great reformer had & heart as tender as a woman's.

Calvin studied in his bed. Every morning at five or six o'clock he had books, manuscripts and papers carried to him there, and he worked on for hours together. If he had occasion to go out, on his return he undressed and went to bed again to continue his studies. In his later years he dictated his writings to secretaries. He rarely corrected anything. The sentences issued complete from his mouth. If he felt his facility of composition leaving him, he forthwith quitted his bed, gave up writing and composing, and went about his out-door duties for days, weeks and months together. But as soon as he felt the inspiration fall upon him again, he went back to his bed, and his secretary set to work forthwith.

Rousseau wrote his works early in the morning; Le Sage at

mid-day; Byron at midnight. Hardouin rose at four in the morning and wrote till late at night. Aristotle was a tremendous worker; he took little sleep, and was constantly retrenching it. He had a contrivance by which he awoke early, and to awake was with him to commence work. Demosthenes passed three months in a cavern by the sea-side, in laboring to overcome the defects of his voice. There he read, studied and declaimed. Rabelais composed his life of Gargantua at Bollay, in the company of Roman cardinals, and under the eyes of the bishop of Paris. La Fontaine wrote his fable chiefly under the shade of a tree, and sometimes by the side of Racine and Boileau. Pascal wrote most of his Thoughts on little scraps of paper, at his by-moments. Fenelon wrote his Talemanchus in the Palace of Versailles, at the court of the Grand Monarque, while discharging the duties of tutor to the Dauphin. That a book so thoroughly democratic should have issued from such a source, and be written by a priest, may seem surprising. De Quincy first promulgated his notion of universal freedom of person, and of throwing all taxes on the landthe germ, perhaps, of the French Revolution-in the boudoir of Madame de Pompadour! Bacon knelt down before composing his great work, and prayed for light from heaven. Pope never could compose well without first disclaiming for some time at the top of his voice and thus rousing his nervous system to its fullest activity.

The life of Liebnitz was one of reading, writing and meditation. This was the secret of his prodigious knowledge. After an attack of the gout, he consigned himself to a diet of bread and milk. Often he slept in a chair, and rarely went to bed till after midnight. Sometimes he was months without quitting his seat, where he slept by night and wrote by day. He had an ulcer in his right leg, which prevented him walking about, even had he wished to do so.

MORAL FRAGRANCE.

"WHAT a pity," said a little boy to his father, as they walked through the garden, "that the rose, after blooming, does not produce fruit, and thus return a thank-offering to summer, for the lovely season of its spring-life. Now, it is called the flower of innocence and joy; then, it would be also the emblem of gratitude." The father answered, "Does it not offer all its loveliness to beautify the spring; and, for the dew and light which it receives from above, does it not fill the air with its delicate fragrance? Thus, like gratitude, bestowing a charm unseen, which enhances every other good. Created for the spring, it dies with the spring; but its withered leaves retain a portion of its sweet fragrance; so in the heart of innocence does gratitude abide, after the kind deed which called it forth is forgotten in our breast."

THE LORD'S PRAYER.

FROM THE GERMAN, BY THE EDITOR.

THE Lord's Prayer is, once for all, the best prayer; for you know who made it. But no man on the face of the earth can so pray as He did; we only stammer and stumble toward it, and some worse yet than others. This however does no injury, Andrew, if we are only in earnest; our dear Father in heaven must always do most himself, and He knows what we mean. Since you wish it, I will tell you honestly how I do when I pray the "Our Father.' Yet I know it is poor enough, and would rather myself be taught. You see, when I wish to say this prayer, I think first of all, of my sainted Father, how good he was, and how willing to give me what I needed. Then I think of the whole world as my Father's house, and all people in Asia, in Europe, in Africa, and in America, seem to me then as if they were my brothers and sisters; and God sits in heaven upon a golden seat, and stretches forth his right hand over the sea, even to the end of earth, and his left hand is full of salvation and goodness, and the mountain tops all around smoke as if with incense-then I begin:

Our Father which art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name.

This already I cannot understand. The Jews, it is said, knew some secrets about the name of God. This I leave as it is, and only wish that our meditations on God, and every trace by which we can know him, may make me and all men feel that he is over all things great and holy.

Thy kingdom come.

Here I think of myself; how now this and now that rules and reigns within me; and how I am borne hither and thither; and how all this is but vanity and sorrow, and leads me to no green spot. And then I think how good it would be for me if only God would bring all this inward warfare to an end, and rule in me himself.

Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.

Here I think of Heaven, with its hosts of holy angels, who do His will with joy, and no sorrow touches them, and how they are blest in love and joy, and praise day and night; and then I think if it were only also thus on earth.

Give us this day our daily bread.

Every one knows what daily bread is, and that we must eat so long as we are in this world, and that it tastes well. I think of this. Then I remember my children, how they love to eat, and how happy they are at the table. And then I pray God to give us always something to eat.