and seek the exaltation of ours, that wisdom and knowledge may be the stability of our times: but this will be best produced by union; it was this effected the deliverance of Europe; and it is this seems intended to effect the overthrow of idolatry and superstition throughout our world. Extract from the Third Report OF THE SHEFFIELD SUNDAY SCHOOL UNION. THE following is the list of teachers and scholars (children and adults), in the nineteen Schools of the Union, according to the latest returns. Schools of the Sheffield Sunday School Union.-1815. Schools. Queen-street Chapel ... Lee Croft Chapel. .... .... Teachers. Scholars. Adults. Coalpit-lane Chapel · Paradise-square Meeting. Zion Chapel, Attercliffe. Methodist Chapel, Attercliffe Methodist School, Darnal Methodist School, Handsworth Wood house By a resolution of the last annual meeting, the committee were authorized to encourage the formation of Sunday Schools in adjacent villages, where such were wanted, by visits, small donations in money or books, and by such other means as might be found expedient. This has been done successfully in several instances. In the extensive parish of Ecclesfield, in consequence of deputations sent from our committee, three considerable Sunday Schools have been established,-at Bradfield, at Grenoside, and in Ecclesfield itself. The beneficial influence of these on parents, children, and teachers has been already felt in an unexpected measure, and acknowledged even by those who at first appeared indifferent or averse to the experiment. In Bradfield especially the plan has been so zealously adopted, that twenty pounds have been subscribed by the neighbours, sixty teachers have enrolled their names, and a hundred and fifty scholars attend on the Sabbath, many of whom, both boys and girls, during the wintermonths, came from great distances, through rain and snow, and on very bad roads. The father of one of these has said, that he is obliged to call his son up on every other morning of the week, but on Sunday the boy rises early without calling. The women who rose early on the morning of the first Christian Sabbath, and went to the sepulchre, saw a vision of angels; and Mary who tarried the longest there was the first to whom the risen Saviour appeared. At Grenoside School there are already thirty-five teachers, and a hundred and fifty scholars. Of the improvement of the latter, the superintendent speaks with much satisfaction, and though they are not, and cannot be, all at once, so well behaved and obedient as children who have been longer under discipline, yet the hearty delight which they take in singing hymns, and the alacrity with which they subscribe for bibles, are encouraging tokens, that future good of the best kind will be wrought in their souls as well as in their manners. Ecclesfield School has thirty-two teachers, and a hundred and five scholars. Many more would attend, were there room to receive them. Such has been the external change of conduct in the youth of this village, and so much more orderly and peaceable is the Sabbath there now than it has been heretofore, that the goodwill, we believe, of every body has been conciliated, and present prospects are very promising. The villages of Totley and Dore have also been visited from our committee; and though not immediately by the agency of our friends, yet certainly from their stirring up the minds of the inhabitants, the latter have redeemed the credit of their neighbourhood by beginning Sunday Schools in each place. They that are not against us are for us; we wish them God's speed; and though they follow not after us, we will not presume to forbid them, so long as they cast out evil spirits in the same name as we cast them out. Thus, in the past year, five flourishing Schools have risen up to call this Union blessed; and through rude and widespread tracts, where the children ran wild as the cattle on the moors, growing up in ignorance and hardness of heart, more than six hundred are gathered into little folds, many of whom we trust will be added to the flock of the good Shepherd on earth, and numbered everlastingly with the redeemed in heaven. Some pecuniary assistance has also been sent to a very meritorious and necessitous establishment at Swinton, near Rotherham, which was thank fully received. Donations of money and books have been voted to Sunday Schools at the Manor, at Gleadless, and conditionally to several other places, which have been visited, but where no opening as yet has been made. In all these missions, it has been the express injunction of the committee to their representatives, not to prescribe or dictate any particular plan, nor prefer one denomination of Christians before another, but to leave the well-disposed people themselves to build upon their own foundation, and to perfect their work under the sanction of Churchmen, Calvinists, or Methodists, according to their local circumstances; for in this Union all true disciples are one in Christ Jesus. We are pleased to learn, that in most, if not in all the Schools in our connection, bible associations have been formed among the children. These ought to be promoted as much as possible, since they afford the readiest, the surest, and the most effectual means of supplying poor families with the Scriptures. We shall proceed to give a few extracts from the numerous details which have been furnished to us by the Schools in the Union. The length of the whole must be our apology for the brevity with which we are compelled to notice each. The Queen-street School informs us, that since the last anniversary, nine teachers belonging to it have been received into church fellowship; and others manifest by their walk and conversation, that the grace of God has not been bestowed on them in vain. Among them too the voice of the Lord has been heard, saying "Be ye also ready." A female teacher, who, for years past, had laboured under much bodily affliction, entered into her eternal rest a few months ago, testifying to those around her, that "the dying love of Jesus was the only ground of her hope in life, and her comfort in death."-A girl, who had left the school, evidenced the good impressions which she had received there, by ministering to the support of her widowed mother to the close of life, with filial piety, and exemplary resignation to the divine will, while she herself was suffering severely in her person as well as in her parent. Our friends of this school earnestly recommend to their brethren and sisters in similar institutions to adopt the plan, which they have found exceedingly beneficial, of spending half an hour of each Sabbath's engagements with the children, in singing, prayer, and affectionate exhortation, since if religious knowledge be not principally inculcated, even Sunday Schools will produce comparatively little good. The adult Schools on the original plan having not equalled in all respects the hopes of their supporters, seven places have been taken in different parts of the town, for the purpose of instructing in small companies such persons as are willing to learn to read, but unwilling to go far out of their way to be taught. (To be continued.) EXTRACTS from the PROCEEDINGS of the LAST ANNUAL MEETING of the HIBERNIAN SUNDAY SCHOOL SOCIETY, THE Rev., Archdeacon Digby in seconding the motion for the reception of the Report, said "We must all be aware of the importance of educating the poor, either in a religious or political point of view. If we would wish to see peace, order and industry in our land, let us attend to the education of the people. But when we remember that we are Christians we find new and more weighty considerations urging us to the perforinance of the duty. As Christians, we know that man has an immortal soul; that all men come into the world children of wrath; that unless they be changed by the spirit of God they must perish, and therefore it is of infinite importance to open to them the sacred Scriptures, by means of which the spirit of God may produce that saving change." "A decree, he said, had gone forth among the people of this land to have their children educated. He was persuaded that it was from the Lord, although they had often no other object in view, than enabling their children to advance themselves in the world. "He observed that the books used in the small schools scattered over the country were of the most despicable and mischievous description. One of the objects of this society is to lead the children of the poor to books of infinite value. It offers them the New Testament, the Bible, and Spelling Books containing extracts from them, and their being read regularly must produce the most beneficial effects. The age of superstition is quickly passing away: education will deliver the people from the superstition in which their forefathers have been immured; the human mind in this country is undergoing an important change, but if we leave the people to themselves; if we neglect our part in guiding the change to a beneficent issue, we have reason to fear dreadful consequences awful days. We must not be satisfied with giving money; we must be active in managing, or at least examining the state of schools, and then we may hope that God will bless our efforts, and that we shall see pure and undefiled religion flourish in our land." Dr. Thorpe.- "He would not have appeared before the society, had it not been for the purpose of expressing his ardent wish, that a Sunday School were instituted for the most wretched, the most friendless, the most unprotected description of children in the country-those who were employed in sweeping our chimneys. They were usually infants that were employed in that unwholesome occupation, and it was the interest of their employers to keep them as diminutive as possible, because if they encreased much in size they became unfit for the work. He would state one case that had actually come before the public. It was an infant that had been employed to sweep a chimney in South Anne Street. The infant was forced up the chimney by his master, and having shewn some inclination to delay coming down, was pulled down by means of a rope that had been attached to his leg. The gentleman, whose chimney was swept, examined the child, and found him one continued sore from head to foot, and sent him to an hospital. The master was apprehended, and when he was brought to trial, the poor infant was produced, wrapped in sheets, oiled, to prevent the linen from sticking in his ulcerated body. It appeared on evidence, that the child having shewn a strong dislike to climb the chimney, the master had been in the habit of kindling straw and burning gunpowder under him, and when, from the dreadful state of laceration in which he was, he felt unwilling to descend, his master had fallen upon the expedient of tying a rope round his leg, and of dragging bin down with it. And when by these means his flesh was wounded and torn, the monster had, for the purpose of further punishing him, roused him from his sleep in the wretched cellar where be lay, and had plunged him in cold water, that he might be reminded of his sores by the smarting of them." "He, (Dr. Thorpe,) was certain that no one could avoid sympathizing in the sorrows of these helpless children, or being anxious to discover some method of alleviating them. He proposed that a Sunday School should be instituted for them; this would cultivate their understanding, by teaching them to read, it would provide for them the solace of kindness and sympathy, but especially it would be a check on their masters, by bringing the children under the inspection of the public (applause ;) he hailed that applause, because it was to him an assurance, that the plan which he had proposed, or some other, would be speedily put in execution." Mr. Latouche. If the opinions of great and learned men, in favour of educating the poor, was necessary, abundance of them could be produced. lie would notice a few. The first that be would mention, was that of good King Edward VI. He enumerated among the remedies for the sores of the commonwealth, good education as the first in dignity and degree, and declared his purpose of shewing his devices therein. He said, "This shall well ease and remedy the deceitful workings of thingsdisobedience of the lower sort, casting of seditious bills, and will clearly take away the idleness of the people." The next authority which he would mention was that of archbishop Tillotson. "There are several ways, says he, of reforming men by the laws of the civil magistrates, by the public preaching of ministers. But the most likely and hopeful reformation of the world must begin with children. Wholesome laws and good sermons are but slow and late ways. The timely and most compendious way is a good education. This may be an effectual prevention of evil, whereas all after ways are at least but remedies, which do always suppose some neglect and omission of early care. He had the suffrage of another Right Reverend Prelate to produce, the Lord Bishop of Chester. He expresses himself as fol |