and lived very near to God. The Bible was her daily delight; and next to God, she lived only for me. Her solicitude for my happiness was incessant, and so certainly could she at all times interpret my looks, that any attempt to conceal anxiety or distress of mind would have been in vain. Nothing, however, but tenderness for each other's feel. ings, could induce either of us for a minute to attempt a concealment of any thing. It was her constant habit to compare every verse she read in the various German, French, Italian, and English versions, and never to pass by a difficulty till it. was cleared up. In this respect she was of eminent use to me, in the translation of the word of God. She was full of compassion for the poor and needy; and until her death, supported several blind and lame persons by a monthly allow ance. I consider them as a prec. ious legacy bequeathed to me. She entered most heartily into all the concerns of the mission, and into the support of schools, particularly those for female native children, and had long supported one at Culwa of that kind. My loss is irreparable, but still I dare not but perfectly acquiesce in the divine will. So many merciful circumstances attend this very heavy affliction as still yield me support beyond any thing I ever felt in other trials. (1.) · I have no domestic strife to reflect on, and add bitterness to affliction. (2.) She was ready to depart. She had long lived on the borders of the heavenly land, and I think lately became more and more heaven ly in her thoughts and conversa tion. (3.) She suffered no long or painful affliction. (4.) She was removed before me, a thing for which we had frequently expressed our wishes to each other; for though I am sure my brethren and my children would have done the utmost in their power to alleviate her affliction if she had survived me, yet no one, nor all united, could have supplied the place of a husband. I have met with much sympathy in my affliction. Religious Communications. MY DEAR SARAH, THE MINISTER'S WIFE As you are about to become the wife of a Christian Minister, and wish me to point out to you the nature of those duties which will devolve upon you, and also the requisite qualifications for a proper discharge of them, I will endeavour to comply with your request so far as I am able; and wherein I am deficient, may the Holy Spirit be your teacher and guide. The station to which you are invited, is at once honourable, important, and responsible. It is hon ourable, to be the companion, the friend, the counsellor of a servant of Christ.-It is important, because it affords many favourable opportu nities of doing good to the household of faith, and of benefiting society in general, so far as the sphere of action extends.—It is also responsible, because an account must be rendered to God of the manner in which its various duties have been discharged. To enter upon it, then, with thoughtless indifference, would certainly be highly culpable. I rejoice, however, that yon are not disposed to act so inconsiderately, and trust you have sought divine direction before you requested the opinion of a fellow creature.As a wife, and especially a minister's wife, it will be your duty to place confidence in your husband; and, like a true daughter of Sarah, to pay respectful deference to his judgment, and an affectionate attention to his personal comfort. You will be expected to sympathize with him in his sorrows, encourage him under bis various trials, counsel him in his difficulties, and to assist him in his labours of active benevolence. It will be your province also to guide the affairs of his household, to govern his servants, and to manage and instruct his children. St. Paul, in addressing Timothy, clearly describes what every Chris tian bishop or minister ought to be; and though he is silent as to the conduct of their wives, yet we are not to infer that he considered it a matter of no importance, because he immediately afterwards enjoins that the wives of deacons should be grave, not slanderous; sober, faithful in all things; from which we may fairly gather his opinion as to the former. If in Apostolic days such qualifications were necessary for the proper discharge of the relative duties of a station so important, surely they are not less so in ours; for, however consistent a minister's own deportment may be, and however desirous he may feel to rule his house well, and to have his children in proper subjection, it will be not only difficult but almost impossible to effect it, except he possess in his wife a help meet who is careful to demean herself according to the character which her husband sustains; aware that much of his happiness as a man and as a Christian, much of his respectability, and even his success as a minister, will greatly depend upon her character and conduct. Personal religion then, ranks fore most in the list of essentials to constitute you a good wife; for whatever are your endowments, natural or acquired-whatever your parentage, property or prospects-if you are a stranger to this life-giving, soul-transforming principle, you are an unsuitable wife for the man who ministers in holy things. Without vital religion you would have no relish for the peculiar privileges of your station-the society of the people of God-the frequent return of religious services: your affinity to one whose work, whose life, and whose conversation are holy, instead of affording pleasure and satisfaction, would be uninteresting and tiresome to your mind. The painful conflicts with which the mind of a minister is often exer: cised, renders the affectionate sympathy of his wife peculiarly neces sary; but how could you enter into feelings, and encourage him under trials, to which your own mind was a stranger. Your own trials also will perhaps be numerous; a large family, a slender income, a delicate constitution; and how upfit would you be to bear all those in a becoming manner without that wisdom which cometh from above; without the aid of that Spirit, who alone can cause tribulations to work patience, patience experience, and experience hope. It is also desirable that the wife of a minister be not a novice in divine things; she should be a child of God, but not an infant. It is her duty to instruct the ignorant; like her husband, she should be the counsellor, the friend, the comforter of the people, particularly of her own sex; but how can this be, except she be a proficient in the school of Christ herself? A young Christian too, is in great danger of being puffed up with a vain conceit of her attainments, without sufficient knowledge of her own heart to be aware of its deceit fulness; consequently, such an one would not be likely to exhibit the. Christian character in its loveliness, as a pattern worthy, the imitation of others. It has often been remarked, that ministers are more frequently unsuitably married than other Christians. I was once in company when the mistakes of good men in this important matter were the subject of conversation. I recollect several supposed reasons were assigned.— One thought deception in the female character was the cause, and said, "A young lady, desirous of changing her condition, will sometimes put on the semblance of piety, profess to be greatly benefited by the -ministry of him whose affections she wishes to engage, and until she has gained her object, will wear a temper and disposition foreign to ber own; but that once secured, she relapses into herself again, reveals her native character, and the deceived husband who courted a Rachel, finds to his lasting discomfort that he has married a Leah.” Another person thought "that a minister aware of the uncertainty of pecuniary support from his people, is likely to consider a fortune with his wife essential to his comfort, and is consequently in danger of making money the principal object of pursuit. Having found that, he is content to hope the rest, and if indeed he cannot at present find ground for hope, he is still willing to believe that God will honour him as the instrument of her conversion, and that it will be his privilege to form her Christian character " A third said "That too easily attracted by a pleasing exterior, by showy accomplishments, or mental endowments, a minister may not always be sufficiently solicitous to ascertain the vitality of religion in the heart of the object whom he selects as the companion of his life." One would hope that all these opinions are erroneous; but should there exist a few cases which appear to confirm them, it is most earnestly to be wished that those ladies would refute the charge, and justify the choice of their husbands by exhibiting before their families, in the church, and to the world, such a line of conduct as shall at least put to silence all gainsayers, and perhaps constrain them to acknowledge they walked worthy of the vocation wherewith they are called. Prudence is also an indispensa ble qualification in the wife of a minister, without it even religion itself, as exhibited in her conduct, would appear unlovely; and though there might be many other excellent traits in her character, yet without this regulating, harmonizing, finishing grace, all the rest would perhaps prove worse than useless. Let it then be your concern, my friend, to possess it: for "wisdom dwells with prudence," and it will teach you the art of self government. Every Christian female, howev. er amiable and placid her natural temper may be, will often feel cause to mourn over the rising of sinful propensities; and in the chequer. ed path of matrimonial life, many things will occur to stir up the la tent seeds of discontent, envy, im patience, peevishness, and a variety of other evils; but prudence will enable you to check them, and to no small command your spirit ; this is attainment, for greater is she that conquereth her spirit than he that taketh a city. It will also govern the tongue, that little but unruly member, by which so much mischief is done in the church and in the world. It is matter of deep regret that the tongues of females, of females professing godliness, should ever be employed in the odious work of detraction, in sowing the seeds of discord, in uttering cruel sarcasms, and thus invidiously injuring the reputation and wounding the feelings of those whose principal crime perhaps is superior excellence; or if not, whose infirmities or faults ought to be cov ered with a mantle of love, and concealed from public observation, rather than presented to the view through the magnifying power of a spleenful lens. If the indulgence of this habit be improper in Christian females in general, it would be still more abhorrent if found in the wife of a minister; hence the necessity of your possessing that prudence which will enable you to govern the tongue, for it will dictate when to speak as well as what to say; it will cause you to order your own conversation aright, and by your influence in some measure to regulate that of your acquaintances; at least, under its government, you will not fail to oast the frown of disapprobation on the invidious defamer, and thus shame the slanderer into silence. Prudence will also govern the conduct. It will repress what is wrong, and urge to the performance of every good work. It will cause your domestic concerns to be managed with economy, regularity and comfort. In your furniture, your table, and your dress, it will lead you to choose what is useful and suitable, rather than what is expen sive and fashionable. Indeed it will be so interwoven in all your arrangements, and seen in your conduct, that the heart of your husband will safely trust in you, assured that you "will do him good, and not evil, all the days of his life." A mind well stored with useful knowledge is a very desirable qualification; because you will be the companion of one, whose pursuits and whose pleasures are principally intellectual. You will be called to associate with respectable and intelligent society; and in the event of your becoming a parent, you should be the instructress and friend, as well as the nurse, of your children. The maternal character is a very important one; to discharge its various duties aright, requires no ordinary measure of wisdom, prudence, and kill, especially as the children of ministers are frequently, and sometimes necessarily, left principally to the management of their mother during their early years.-If every mother were a Mrs. Watts, a Mrs. Doddridge, or a Mrs. Cecil, how incalculable would be the blessing to the rising generation ! This, however, is rather a subject for after consideration; but I name it to shew the propriety of possessing suitable endowments for the station which you expect to Occupy. I once heard a gentleman say of his deceased wife, that she was equally qualified for the business of the kitchen, the nursery, the sickroom and the parlour; and was alike at home in the cottage of the peasant, and in the drawing-room of the merchant. A minister's wife so endowed must be a treasure to the man who possesses her, and a blessing to the circle in which she moves. That you may thus enrich your husband and benefit society, is the earnest prayer of my dear Sarah's AFFECTIONATE FRIEND. For the American Bap. Mag. EDUCATION OF MINISTERS. Rev. Sirs, I HAVE observed with pleasure, that our denomination in this country generally begin to be sensible of the importance of having for their spiritual teachers, "able men," as well as "such as fear God;" and that some of them do not stop here, but begin to act as well as to think upon the subject. Though deeply impressed with the truth, that a "Paul may plant, and an Apollos water" in vain, unless "God give the increase," they are also sensible that the wise Disposer of all things is pleased to ef fect his gracious purposes by the use of means; and that it is not the less their duty to cultivate the soil and to sow the seed, because, after These inceptive exertions augur well; but they are far from being general, or proportionate to the ends to be accomplished. The Apostle, when enumerating the qualifications of a Christian 1. minister, says, he "must have a good report of them which are without, lest he fall into reproach." As knowledge is more generally diffused through the world at the present, than at any former period, and as our own country may boast her share of intelligent citizens, our public teachers ought to be proportionably more learned, in order to obtain that "good report of them which are without," and to secure that public confidence, which are necessary to their suc cess. of God may be pertect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." that he may be able to explain those transient and obscure allusions to the customs of the age or the circumstances of time and place, which are often found in the sacred writings, that he may be qualified to elucidate difficult passages, and to harmonize such as are apparently contradictory, he must have a good knowledge of the geography and profane history of the eastern world. He must be particularly acquainted with the topography of Judea or Palestine, and with the customs and manners of the Roman and Jewish nations. But these studies cannot be pursued, this knowledge cannot be acquired, without leisure, and the means of subsistence. Few of those, who are called to proclaim "the glad tidings" of salvation, are what are called the "noble" of the earth. Few of them are in circumstances that enable them to obtain such knowledge as they consider desirable and requisite. Under a deep sense of the responsibility of the ministerial office, they have many gloomy hours, and suffer many an anxious thought respecting their duty and their qualifications for the work. They exclaim with the learned Apostle, Who is sufficient for these things? Unless the hand of Christian charity is extended fo their assistance, many relinquish the sacred vocation in despair of preparing themselves for it; and, as for the rest who persevere and eventually engage in it, their sphere of usefulness is much circumscribed. The people must believe that their religious instructors are honest and sincere, and, furthermore, that they are capable of instructing others, capable of expounding the scriptures, and of defending the doctrines which they preach, or they will not lend the listening ear, will not confide in their instructions. One who thinks it his duty to become a minister of the gospel, and who wishes to be like Apollos, an eloquent man, and mighty in the scriptures," must give himself to study and serious meditation. "The Now it should be a matter of gift of tongues," which was confer- serious inquiry with Christians, red by immediate inspiration on the whether they have done or are doprimitive teachers of Christianity, ing all that they ought to du, for and which was designed, like the the instruction of those pious youth, other miracles, to convince an idol- who are destined to fill our pulpits, atrous world that this religion was and upon whose labours the future from heaven, is now to be acquir prosperity of the church must in a ed only by industry and persever- considerable degree depend. While ing research. we are contributing to various That the man |