not look themselves for the bright side of things, nor even look upon that bright side when pointed out for them and to them by others.

Lewis Jackman, who lost his useful donkey, and won twenty staunch friends for ever after, who would never have troubled about him but for the said loss, could not be brought to see that sunshine came out of the cloud, for many a long day; and then only got as far

as,

66

Well, hap it wur; mayhap it wur so-but t'wur a grit loss, sur-a grit loss, it wur."

And the thing is to see the lining when the cloud is over you. "Behind a frowning Providence," for example, to "see the smiling Face." Instead of bringing brightness, some clouds may remain dark and thick and black for many a year; and show only a very little bit of the silver lining they really have. But a bright and kindly disposition will find the bright fringe and the bright lining inevitably and invariably. "It is not so bad as it might be" is a speech which when applied, as by brave hearts it so generally is, to really adverse circumstances, renders the proverb familiarly

and in a truly manful fashion. Sometimes, indeed, the cloud's darkness is so deeply oppressive that the soul is almost unable, for a time, to watch for and recognize the illumined border, but there it always is, if the darkness is only trouble-darkness, and not also sindarkness.

And I ought not to exclude even the cloud of sin's anguish and remorse, if repentance be added to cause the dropping down of healthful showers, from the scope of the proverb. The silver lining of Peter's sorrow was the Master's pardon, and Peter's future amendment. The darkest of Heaven's frowns are bordered by the brightness of promises that can never fail, till the blackness and darkness of eternal penalty succeed the blackness and darkness of present sinful probation.

I dare say the proverb is most forcible in its merely social and moral bearings, but it has also its religious bearing; and the more frequently we can join together, by elevation of the one rather than depression of the other, social truths with religious, so much the better for both readers and writers, and for the world at large.

N the 5th of October, 1878, at the age of seventy-four, this eminent Christian philanthropist entered into rest. He belonged to a former generation rather than to the present; for having been completely prostrated by excessive self-denying efforts for the benefit of his fellow-creatures, he had for some years retired from public life, and was known only in a small circle of intimate friends.

But more than forty years ago, George D. Thompson was well known and deservedly popular, throughout Great Britain and the United States of America, as the largehearted, courageous, eloquent advocate of the oppressed and down-trodden. Lord Brougham once spoke of him as "the

greatest natural orator of the day;" and Mr. Bright said, in 1864, "I have always considered Mr. Thompson the real liberator of the slaves in the English Colonies; for without his commanding eloquence, made irresistible by the blessedness of his cause, I do not think all the other agencies then at work would have procured their freedom.

I can say honestly, and I say it with pleasure, there has been no movement during the last thirty years on behalf of any good cause, and there has been no victory in this country to freedom and the people, in which he has not borne an honourable part."

Mr. Thompson's philanthropic life-labours ended, as we have said, in a season of retirement.

"And when his noblest work was done,
His soul relied on Christ alone."

Those who remember the powerful argu

ments, the thrilling appeals, and the graceful style of Mr. Thompson's wonderful lectures, or who were privileged to read his eloquent speeches in the House of Commons, or to listen to his simple, earnest Gospel addresses as a lay preacher in some village school, will feel interested in perusing the subjoined extract from a letter written by a gentleman who saw him only a few months before he "entered into life" :

"I had the privilege of paying a visit to the late Mr. George Thompson, on June 18th, 1878,-a visit I much enjoyed at the time, and of which I have still the most happy recollections. I was very much struck with his deep humility, shown as much, if not even more, by his countenance and tone

carnation,' and ending with 'By the coming of the Holy Ghost,' as though his faith would take hold of and appropriate the living, suffering, dying, rising, ascending, interceding Jesus, the whole Christ, -as his only but all-sufficient ground of acceptance.

"After rising from our knees,-his face looking even more heavenly than before,—in response to some word of mine, he quoted the lines::

'Other refuge have I none.'

And also these:

'Guilty I stand before Thy face,

But oh! for me Thy Son has died.'

"As I walked back into Leeds, and thought over the interview I had been privileged to

ing of the Saviour and his own relation to Him, his words were full of deep penitence, of simple yet unwavering trust, of the most heartfelt gratitude, and, pervading all, of the most devout adoration.

"When about to leave, I could not find words more suitable in which to express my wishes for this servant of God than those of 2 Cor. xiii. 14, which had for several days been much in my thoughts. When I had repeated them, and may I say I did it with. no little fervour, for my heart was full, as I gazed into his face and thought of his great life-work, he continued to hold my hand in both his hands, and, with much feeling, said, 'Say that again upon your knees.'

"I knelt, and though so feeble and suffering as I knew him then to be, he, with my assistance, knelt too. After a short prayer, for I feared being long on his account, he followed me, and in the course of his petitions he used the words of the Litany, beginning By the mystery of Thy Holy In

S

that I never had met one who seemed to realize so deeply the fact that he, a poor, guilty sinner, was in the very presence, and looking up into the face of, his reconciled Father, God in Christ; and I thank God for having been permitted to spend an hour with one so truly good and great. I felt, as I walked on into the busy, bustling town, that the room from which I had come was indeed a hallowed spot."

Another friend, who visited Mr. Thompson a year before his departure, has told me that when reference was made to the comfort he must have in looking back on his useful, well-spent life, he appeared uneasy, and repeated with deep feeling the lines:

I the chief of sinners am, But Jesus died for me."

The greater the usefulness, the greater the humility, is a law of the kingdom of grace :—

"Nearest the throne itself must be
The footstool of humility."

M. A. R.

F. R. HAVERGAL.

66

T was once recorded of a modern magnate that he had been in London buying pictures by the yard; and this remark is often applicable to those who go to look at pictures. It can be said in respect to painting as well as nature, that the eye sees that which it brings the power of seeing. One object and end of a picture, especially a study in black and white, is to arouse thought and suggest reflection. The highly-finished work, rich in colours and luxuriant in light and shade, is calculated to lull into repose and satisfy on the surface, the average mind and eye. The picture in which are discernible only forms and colours is either not true art,-only a piece of mechanism, so many inches of canvas, so much paint, or the fault lies in the observer who understands not what art is or ought to be, and possesses not the faculty or the desire to look from the seen and tangible to the unseen yet none the less real and living sources of strength and beauty. Too often in this wide domain, open to all, the pretender and the copyist as well as the worker with brains, it is all as in other fields outsidesurface-work, mere show. Expertness there may be, much manual dexterity, and even prettiness; but photograph of figure or landscape is no more the voice of nature or the embodiment of a lofty ideal than the dummy in a draper's window or the hills in a drop scene. There must ever be the influence and the aim to suggest on the one hand, and some faculty of insight on the other,-the gift to see, as it were, the worker, and realize to some extent the circumstances and conditions out of which the creation, the result of thought, experience, imagination, has arisen.

At his best period, the knowledge and inspiration of Landseer were largely drawn from

Scottish soil and sources. His most familiar pictures and the outlines in his numerous Sketch Books show this; and the homely yet strong and striking drawings, reproduced here as best engraver and printer can do, indicate the source and secret of much that otherwise would remain dark and unintelligible. Let us follow this ardent student and worker, go with him where he goes and look upon the sights which enriched his fertile imagination, and it will enable us to perceive fresh beauties and form a higher estimate in surveying that which may have appeared to us the outcome alone of wonderful skill or creative genius. There is in all that Landseer did a realism which pleases the eye and speaks of honest execution, as well as a poetry that gratifies the imagination; but there is also that which speaks in audible language of the people amongst whom he moved, of habits and customs and scenes;-the human history which tells more of the mind and real life than half the histories that have been written.

Life in the north of Scotland is many-sided; and apt as the student was, and varied as were his powers, we do not find him adequately embodying its nobler side: the intellectual activity which exalteth a nation, and has ever formed the deepest solace of the people. Portraiture was not his special gift, although he has given many proofs that he could have produced a portrait gallery which would have told us much of the men and women of his time, the higher life and character of a strong race. His profile of Sir Walter Scott, which was disposed of at the Sale, and the pen-and-ink outlines which he made of that marvellous head, proved what he might have done and awaken regret that he did not preserve in some form his impress of notabilities, igh and low, with whom he came in contact. His delight was in