We left Philadelphia at six o'clock this morning. The cars belonging to the three regular lines that run on the Rail Road to Harrisburg, filled with about one hundred and fifty passengers, and fastened to each other in one train, were moved by the same locomotive. There is something very exhilarating in the act of being borne through a beautiful country at the rate of fifteen miles an hour. It seemed as we moved along as though our whole train was instinct with life, and endowed with magic pinions, which it had only to spread abroad, and skim over the surface of the ground with the fleetness of the wind. As we passed along from the city, one varied, and verdant scene of all that is lovely in hill and dale, forest and field, orchard and farm-house, presented itself in quick succession after another--filling up the whole way with images as beautiful and varied as are brought to the eye by every turn of the kaleidoscope. The country between Philadelphia and Harrisburg in its outlines and agricultural aspect strikingly reminded me of western New York. The impress of thrift and wealth are enstamped upon every vale and hill-side that meets your eye in this vast fertile landscape. I could not but ask myself, however, "Is there a moral beauty here, displayed in the lives of those who cultivate this land, corresponding with the marks of material loveliness which the Creator has spread over all this scene? Do the walls of these cottages and farm-houses resound to the voice of prayer and praise with each rising and setting sun? Is the Saviour of sinners universally known, and loved, and served here? Do all these people, whose homes are scattered along this range of country, regard this beautiful region as the theatre on which God has placed them to prepare for the skies?" I know not what the state of religion may be generally through these counties, but when I turned to a tabular list to see how many churches and communicants we numbered in this extent of country, I felt sad to find how small a part of the land we had possessed, and how very little we, as a branch of the great Catholic Church, were doing to extend the kingdom of Christ even in our very neighborhood. I hope other communions have done and are doing more to diffuse vital godliness through this section of the land than we, otherwise there must be a lamentable want of that faith which Christ came to establish on the earth. O when shall prayer go up as one thick cloud of incense from every house and hamlet scattered through this region, made so fair and beautiful by a divine hand! Then indeed will "the valleys which stand so thick with corn laugh and sing, the hills will clap their hands, and every thing that hath breath praise the Lord."