THE LAY PREACHER. A MISCELLANY OF HELPS FOR THE STUDY, PULPIT, PLATFORM, AND DESK. "He commanded us to preach unto the people."—Acts x., 42. THIRD SERIES. VOL. II. BOD London: F. E. LONGLEY, 39, WARWICK LANE, E.C. 1877. Per. 1320.e. 20. THE LAY PREACHER. TOPICAL PAPER. RING OUT THE OLD: RING IN THE NEW. HIS is New-year's Day, and from a thousand tall steeples the THIS joyful bells ring out their salutes in merry chimes, as though it were a pleasure to bury the old year and a duty to forget it, and every heart should be gay and hopeful, and the imagination arise and paint a brilliant scene of prosperous weeks and months to come. The chimes utter no misgiving as to the schemes men's thoughts formulate, no fear that the human will be held in captivity by the subtle enemies that, though invisible, throng the thoroughfare of life high up in regions ethereal they are happily unconscious of failure, sorrow and tears, and ring on as though the modern world were blessed with “Paradise restored," and all men lived in groves of plenty and luxuriated in gardens fragrant and beautiful. But let not the bells mislead us. The death of a year is a solemn event, and should provoke serious enquiry, and prove fertile in suggestions respecting our work for God and His Church. To some the year has brought financial prosperity, to others painful embarrassment; in some cases uninterrupted personal and family health has laid us under powerful obligations to a kind Providence, in others pain and weakness have tried our graces and furbished our weapons, and not a few have been called to watch at the bedside of the dying, and then to follow loved remains to the asylum where "the rich and poor meet together," and "the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary be at rest.” All this should mean increased knowledge, ripened experience, and a con-stant sense of multiplied responsibility; and, arising therefrom, deepened seriousness, industry and care-a spiritual life, more mellow, obedient. and watchful. But when we turn to review the course taken during the year as preachers of the word, what do we see? Fifty-three Sabbaths have been given us for special work, and on many of them we have occupied the pulpit and professedly broken to perishing men the bread of life. What has been the outcome of all this labour, which, besides work in public, represents extensive reading, elaborate writing, and protracted study, at home? Has each been the means of saving one sinner a week, one a month, one in six months; or, is it the humiliating conviction of many that in three hundred and sixty-six days they have not |