the place of language, particularly among savages, unenlightened in the mysteries of religion. Father Garzes, in 1775, seems to have known the importance of pictorial symbols in converting the untutored savages of California. He travelled with a standard, upon which the Holy Virgin Mary was painted on one side, and a grotesque representation of his Satanic Majesty in the flames of hell on the other. The Fathers believed that they held their commission as ambassadors of Heaven, and, as such, they were only fulfilling the divine order: "Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." Those faithful shepherds soon brought in thousands of swarthy Indians into their spiritual folds, and by their industry and husbandry the wilderness was made "to bud and blossom as the rose."

Religion, or rather, "the faith that is in us," is the result of education, as much as the knowledge of mathematics. Men are Christians, because they happen to be born and educated in a Christian land, and consequently believe in the faith of their fathers; so it is with the Turks, who are obstinately inconvertible, and bigoted in the belief that Islamism is the true religion, and the Koran a heavenly production, received by their Prophet from the angel Gabriel; so is it also with the ancient and scattered race, the descendants of Abraham, who still cherish the hope, as their ancestors have done for ages, that the Messiah has yet to come. To convert the heathen savages of the world is a stupendous undertaking. Before they can be reasoned with, a knowledge of their language is indispensably necessary. They are at all times, and under all circumstances, slow to believe that their idolatrous rites are not holy, and their sacrifices unaccep

table to the Great Spirit, and that all their glorious traditions of the past are fabulous and false. Superstition, in this enlightened age, can still boast of having far more votaries under her grinding influence, clinging to her bloody shrines, than the indefatigable workings of 1800 years have been able to accomplish for the enlightened and salutary system of Christianity.

Since the Moravian Brethren, in 1732, led the way to Christinize the Gentiles, millions of dollars have been generously spent and good men have sacrificed their lives in the cause, and in few cases only can we discover that the results of Missionary labor have been commensurate with the accompanying dangers and the expense. Thousands annually contribute, and liberally too, for the purpose of feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and enlightening the benighted in foreign lands, while they seem to be entirely blind to the wretchedness, and physical and spiritual wants that immediately surround them. However, let Bible and Tract Societies continue to flourish. They give employment to mechanics at home in their paper-making, printing, and binding establishments, and, doubtless, have accomplished a vast amount of good in less favored regions. It is true that blood-stained idols have been hurled from their pedestals, and the Cross, the symbol of Christianity, been erected in their stead; but Pagan races have degenerated, and their population rapidly decreased, and in many cases wholly disappeared, where Missions have been established. Where are the tribes that Cortez conquered, and his two travelling fathers, Diaz and Olmedo, baptized in the Christian's faith? There was no appeal to reason in their boasted conversions. Their logic was the logic of the sword. Where is there an Aztec living to speak of the beautiful mythol

ogy of his race, which was far more enlightened than that of the Egyptians, and little inferior to the mythological systems of Greece and Rome? Where are now the Indians, those barbarous catechumens who were kneeling worshippers at the altars of Christianity, erected by the holy Fathers of Upper California? A few of their descendants still attend divine worship in some of the old Mission churches; but they are rapidly passing away. Not one can be seen lingering about the door of the Mission Dolores. A superior race live where they lived and kneel where they knelt. So pass away all human systems that are not in keeping with the onward spirit of progression.

A Voice from California.

W

find Freedom

ITH a little band of faithful followers, we tempest-tossed upon the Atlantic in 1620. After a long perilous voyage, the May-Flower is safely moored. Consecrated to her holy cause, the banner of Liberty is planted on the barren rock of Plymouth. The Pilgrim Fathers kneel in gratitude to the God of their sires, and the welkin rings with their psalms of thanksgiving.

"Though years

Elapse, and others share as dark a doom,

They but augment the deep and swelling thoughts
Which overspread all others, and conduct

The world at last to freedom."

Free from institutions that were repugnant to their feelings; far separated from the corrupting influence of a court remarkable only for its debauchery, with a profligate monarch at its head, the Puritans, with a rigid faith and a firm reliance upon Providence, laid the foundations of a mighty empire of freedom, that was destined to command the respect and admiration of the world. The plough soon furrowed the virgin soil, and the ring of the axe was heard in the forest. School-houses were erected, colleges were founded and endowed, and the spires of their churches pointed to their eternal home. The rocks and the glens of New England, that once echoed with the horrid war whoop of the Indian, soon rang choral with the stirring songs

of freedom. Industry was encouraged, and labor was rewarded. Colonies sprang up rapidly, and flourished in different parts of America. Virginia and the Carolinas were settled by the English, and New York City was founded by the Dutch in 1612. States were formed, and entered into a bond of union, adopting the title of United States, September ninth, 1776. The blood that had been shed at Lexington and at Bunker Hill, quickly aroused the whole people to a sense of their danger. The Declaration of Independence was the consequence. That immortal instrument, emanating from the collective wisdom of the country, and boldly subscribed to by the great and good men of the times, immediately inspired the people of every State and territory with perfect confidence in the ultimate triumph of freedom, and in the honesty and unbending resolution of those who pledged "their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor," to maintain the liberty of their native land, or perish in the attempt.

"Easier were it

To hurl the rooted mountain from its base,
Than force the yoke of slavery upon men
Determined to be free."

The press, in the trying times of the revolutionary struggle, contributed in no small measure to the achievement of national independence. The first newspaper that was started in the United States was in 1704. It was styled the Boston NewsLetter, and lasted for seventy years. Simultaneously with the first number of the Boston Gazette, in 1719, commenced the American Weekly Mercury at Philadelphia. Six years afterward the New York Gazette made its appearance. Shortly after that period, every State could boast of its printing-presses