entranced in admiration before the sculptures and the paintings of the great masters of art. But this people, so polished, and so joyous, are strangers to that deep-toned earnestness and gravity which makes a nation great through the inspiring hopes of a life immortal and divine;—they are “filled with all unrighteousness,” and, in times of political excitement, amid scenes of cruelty and savage violence, they give awful proof that “they have no fear of God before their eyes.” The new Crystal Palace, now in progress in the neighbourhood of this metropolis, is to be a spacious temple, dedicated to science and art, in which all that is ingenious and beautiful and rare may be exhibited for the improvement and intellectual gratification of the people. This is an object which assuredly every enlightened Christian would applaud and approve, if confined within the limits which Scripture prescribes. We consider it most desirable that facilities should be afforded to our population devoutly to contemplate the works of God, as in glory and beauty they have sprung from his plastic hand, and to survey the marvellous productions of that genius and skill of which He is the Divine original. We believe, science and learning and art, even now, are so many pioneers preparing the way of the Lord; and that at the period when the religion of the cross shall triumph, they will bring all their trophies and lay them down at Emmanuel’s feet. But, my brethren, before that day can come, science, genius, learning, and art, must be “baptized and sanctified:” they must be subordinated to the progress of the Redeemer’s kingdom. And sure I am, that if they are put in the place of religion—if they are brought into collision with, and antagonism to a law that is alike immutable and divine—if they arrogate to themselves half the day which belongs exclusively and entirely to Him who is Lord of the Sabbath—if, in the language of impious presumption, they say, “we have a fane as holy as the Christian temple—our claims to impart instruction are equal to those who preach the gospel to the poor, and who speak of death and judgment, of heaven and hell”—then, I say, science however profound, genius however soaring, art however exquisitely skilful, put forward blasphemous claims; and if we, as a nation, from deference to their pretensions, sanction the public profanation of any portion of the Sabbath, “our root shall be as rottenness, and our blossom shall go up as dust, because we shall have cast away the law of the Lord of Hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.”