the matter of our desires, yet He does not so often give us great things beyond the spirit of our desires, beyond the quickness, vivacity, and fervour of our minds: for there is but one thing in the world that God hates, besides sin, that is, indifferency and lukewarmness; which, although it hath not in it the direct nature of sin, yet it hath this testimony from God, that it is loathsome and abominable; and excepting this thing alone, God never said so of anything in the New Testament, but what was a direct breach of a commandment. The reason of it is, because lukewarmness, or an indifferent spirit, is an undervaluing of God and of religion; it is a separation of reason from affections, and a perfect conviction of the understanding to the goodness of a duty, but a refusing to follow what we understand. For he that is lukewarm alway, understands the better way, and seldom pursues it ; he hath so much reason as is sufficient, but he will not obey it; his will does not follow the dictate of his understanding, and therefore it is unnatural. St James, in his accounts concerning an effective prayer, not only requires that he be a just man who prays, but his prayer must be fervent ; an effectual fervent prayer," so our English reads it; it must be an intent, zealous, busy, operative prayer; for consider what a huge indecency it is, that a man should speak to God for a thing that he values not; or that he should not value a thing, without which he cannot be happy; or that he should spend his religion upon a trifle; and if it be not a trifle, that he should not spend his affections upon it. If our prayers be for temporal things, I shall not need to stir up your affections to be passionate for their purchase; we desire them greedily, we run after them intemperately, we are kept from them with huge impatience; and yet the things of religion and the spirit are the only things that ought to be desired vehemently, and pursued passionately, because God hath set such a value upon them, that they are the effects of His greatest loving-kindness; they are the purchases of Christ's blood, and the effect of His continual intercession, the fruits of His bloody sacrifice, and the gifts of His healing and saving mercy; the graces of God's Spirit, and the only instruments of felicity: and if we can have fondnesses for

things indifferent or dangerous, our prayers upbraid our spirits when we beg coldly and tamely for those things for which we ought to die, which are more precious than the globes of kings and weightier than imperial sceptres, richer than the spoils of the sea or the treasures of the Indian hills.

[IN Mr Southey's "Sir Thomas More," the following account of the Beguines of Belgium, and the Sisters of Charity of France, is reprinted from the "London Medical Gazette," vol. i.]

A few summers ago I passed through Flanders on my way tỏ Germany, and at the hospital at Bruges saw some of the Beguines, and heard the physician, with whom I was intimate, speak in strong terms of their services; he said, "There are no such nurses." I saw them in the wards attending on the sick, and in the chapel of the hospital on their knees washing the floor. They were obviously a superior class of women, and the contrast was striking between these menial offices and the respectability of their dress and appearance; but the Beguinage of Ghent is one of their principal establishments, and, spending a Sunday there, I went in the evening to vespers. It was twilight when I entered the chapel. It was dimly lighted by two or three tall tapers before the altar and a few candles at the remotest end of the building in the orchestra, but the body of the chapel was in deep gloom, filled from end to end with several hundreds of these nuns seated in rows, in their dark dresses and white cowls, silent and motionless, excepting now and then when one of them started up, and stretching out her arms in the attitude of the crucifixion, stood in that posture many minutes, then sank and disappeared among the crowd. The gloom of the chapel-the long line of these unearthly-looking figures like so many corpses propped up in their grave-clothes-the dead silence of the building, once only

interrupted by a few voices in the distant orchestra chanting vespers, was one of the most striking sights I ever beheld. To some readers, the occasional attitude of the nuns may seem an absurd expression of fanaticism, but they are anything but fanatics. Whoever is accustomed to the manners of continental nations, knows that they employ grimace in everything. I much doubt whether, apart from the internal emotion of piety, the external expression of it is graceful in any one, save only in a little child in his night-shirt, on his knees, saying his evening

prayer.

The Beguinage, or residence of the Beguines at Ghent, is a little town of itself, adjoining the city, and enclosed from it. The transition from the crowded streets of Ghent to the silence and solitude of the Beguinage is very striking. The houses in which the Beguines reside are contiguous, each having its small garden, and on the door the name, not of the resident, but of the protecting saint of the house; these houses are ranged into streets. There is also the large church, which we visited, and a burialground, in which there are no monuments. There are upwards of six hundred of these nuns in the Beguinage of Ghent, and about six thousand in Brabant and Flanders. They receive sick persons into the Beguinage, and not only nurse but support them until they are recovered; they also go out to nurse the sick. They are bound by no vow excepting to be chaste and obedient while they remain in the order; they have the power of quitting it and returning again into the world whenever they please, but this it is said they seldom or never do. They are most of them women unmarried, or widows past the middle of life. In 1244, a synod at Fritzlau decided that no Beguine should be younger than forty years of age. They generally dine together in the refectory; their apartments are barely yet comfortably furnished, and, like all the habitations of Flanders, remarkably clean. About their origin and name little is known by the Beguines themselves, or is to be found in books. For the following particulars I am chiefly indebted to the "Histoire des Ordres Monastiques," (tome viii.) Some attribute both their origin and name to St Begghe, who

lived in the seventh century; others to Lambert le Begue, who lived about the end of the twelfth century. This latter saint is said to have founded two communities of them at Liege, one for women, in 1173, the other for men, in 1177. After his death they multiplied fast, and were introduced by St Louis to Paris, and other French cities. The plan flourished in France, and was adopted under other forms and names. In 1443, Nicholas Rollin, Chancellor to Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, founded a hospital at Beaune and brought six Beguines from Malines to attend upon it, and the hospital became so famed for the care of its patients, that the opulent people of the neighbourhood when sick were often removed to it, preferring its attendance to what they received at home. In one part of the hospital there was a large square court, bordered with galleries leading to apartments suitable to such patients; when they quitted the hospital the donations which they left were added to its funds.

The Sœurs de la Charité of France are another order of religious nurses, but different from the Beguines in being bound by monastic vows. They originated in a charity sermon, perhaps the most useful and extensive in its influence that ever was preached. Vincent de Paul, a celebrated missionary, preaching at Châtillon, in 1617, recommended a poor sick family of the neighbourhood to the care of his congregation. At the conclusion of the sermon a number of persons visited the sick family with bread, wine, meat, and other comforts. This led to the formation of a committee of charitable women, under the direction of Vincent de Paul, who went about relieving the sick poor of the neighbourhood, and met every month to give an account of their proceedings to their superior. Such was the origin of the celebrated order of the Sœurs de la Charité. Wherever this missionary went he attempted to form similar establishments. From the country they spread to cities, and first to Paris, where, in 1629, they were established in the parish of St Saviour.

And in 1625, a female devotee, named Le Gras, joined the order of the Sœurs de la Charité. She was married young to M. Le Gras, one of whose family had founded a hospital at Puy, but becoming

a widow in 1625, in the thirty-fourth year of her age, she made a vow of celibacy, and dedicated the rest of her life to the service of the poor. In her Vincent de Paul found a great accession. Under his direction she took many journeys, visiting and inspecting the establishments which he had founded. She was commonly accompanied by a few pious ladies. Many women of quality enrolled tnemselves in the order, but the superiors were assisted by inferior servants. The Hôtel-Dieu was the first hospital in Paris where they exercised their vocation. This they visited every day, supplying the patients with comforts above what the hospital afforded, and administering, besides, religious consolation. By degrees they spread into all the provinces of France, and at length the Queen of Poland requested Mademoiselle Le Gras, for though a widow that was her title, to send her a supply of Sœurs de la Charité, who were thus established in Varsovia, in 1652. At length, after a long life spent in the service of charity and religion, Mademoiselle Le Gras died on the 15th of March 1660, nearly seventy years of age, and for a day and a half her body lay exposed to the gaze of the pious.

A country clergyman, who spent several years in various parts of France, gives an account of the present state of the order, which, together with what I have gathered from other sources, is in substance as follows:-It consists of women of all ranks, many of them of the higher orders. After a year's novitiate in the convent, they take a vow which binds them to the order for the rest of their lives. They have two objects, to attend the sick and to educate the poor; they are spread all over France, are the superior nurses at the hospitals, and are to be found in every town, and often even in villages. Go into the Paris hospitals at almost any hour of the day, and you will see one of these respectable looking women, in her black gown and white hood, passing slowly from bed to bed, and stopping to inquire of some poor wretch what little comfort he is fancying will alleviate his sufferings. If a parochial curé wants assistance in the care of his flock, he applies to the order of Les Soeurs de la Charité. Two of them (for they generally go in couples) set out on their charitable