The Sun.
London, England, 1850-01-01 00:00:00

THE INFANT'S PRAYER,

[ln the following graceful and touching verses,
transcribed from the Guardian, we detect the hand of
the gifted and ingenious author of the "Christian
Life." The poem here submitted to our readers is
the third of a series entitled " Lyra Spiritualis;
Thoughts in Verse on Sacred Themes," and the
charming picture pourtrayed in it, while according
with many of the effusions contained in the last work
of the Rev. Robert Montgomery, amply justifies the
commendation pronounced on that work by our-
selves.]

Bend, Angel! from thy throne of bliss,
A living type to see,
Whose pureness, in a w orld like this,
Partakes of heaven and thee,—
With lisping grace and lovely awe
God's infant kneels in prayer,
Looking as it by faith it saw
What lips cannot declare :
For oh ! that face with worship rife
Tells more than tones convey,—
Solt pulses of bapti:mal
Deep in the bosom play.
On earth my Saviour once enwreathtd
Around a sinless child
His loving arms, and o'er it breathed
A blessing, deep as mild,
And still that breath of awful love
So charms our inward ear,
That children seem to God above
Angelically near.
In vain would plastic Sculpture dream
It moulds such beauty now,
Or, poet-worth rifl,ct the gleam
That sanctifies thy brow,—
For earth and heaven around thee twine
A double charm, that glows
With more than marble can define,
Or lyre-born language knows.
How blest, to watch thy myriad ways
Of fawnlike grace, and glee,
And call thee bright as vernal rays,
Or sun•tints on the sea!—

Or hear the music of thy mind
In broken lisps of song,
Whoso echo seems the spring-tont d wind
O'er leaflets borne along.

Elastic as the vital 13,e( x?,
Thy tairy m,,tiorts Wide,
With flexure, of infantile ease
To each glad step supplied;

While gol•'en kicks in glittering play
Leke woven sunbeams deuce,
And purer than the y.,ung•e)ed May
Thy soul's ethereal &rice;
And buds and blossoms, too, of thought,
Betray 'heir beauteous spell,
Telling that Christ within bath wrought
Far more than speech can tell.
But slumber brings a Matchless grace
To thy cherubic form,—
For who can watch a sinless face
Nor bow befoie the charm?
The silent loveliness of sleep
Seri nes thy features then,
And purity, v.hich makes to weep
The sin-worn hearts of men!
But Beauty fades: —and I would learn
The Church's lore from thee,
And in the babe some truths discern
That grasp eternity.—
Thee at her consecrating Fount
Our own true Mother gave
Regen'rate life, by which to mount
O'er guilt, and death, and grave.
Thus, fair-browed Thing! whose budding charms
Inwreath maternal heart,
Oh, never from thy Saviour's arms
By recreant will depart.
Baptismal blessings, rich and rare,
Around thee throng and dwell,
Till life becomes embodied prayer,
And truth thy guardian spell.
Still on tby forehead, crossed by grace,
May dews of mercy rest,
And God enrol thee in that race,—
The " Abba" of the blest

Far down within thy spirit's core
May germs of Christ-born love
His presence, Whom the heavens adore,
By secret token prove.
Mere sense is dim, and earthly mind
Seems all unfit to know,
Hop water, with the Word combined,
Can primal grace bestow.
Enough for faith, if God decree
A Sacrament divine,
Whereby an infant soul may be
His everlasting shrine.
Dec. 19,1849. '

tft

THE BRITISH MUSEUM.—This institution closed
yesterday afternoon, fur the purpose of cleansing, &c.,
and will be re-opened to the public on Wednesday, the
9th in.tant. The total number of visitors to the
Museum from Wednesday last until yesterday inclusive,
was 41,947.

- -
REFUSAL TO MARRY BY A CLERGYMAN.—ine
Liverpool Slaudurd of To( sday last sa)s:—" We are
inlortt•ed that the Government solicitor, Mr. Reynolds,
ingructed his agents at Liverpool to prerent an indict-
merit at the pre s. nt ti,siz.s against the Rev. Moorhouse
James, 11. A (13. A. 1535), formerly of Jesus College,
eumbent of Bedford, ne.;r Leigh, for refusing to marry
Henry lri,f.er anti Ano,her. 'rite superintendent registrar
of ehe district was examined before the grand jury, at
uive,rned
Pool. on Wednesc);t and a true bill has been re-
iitto court. lila( trial will take place at the
March assiz,e"
THE SUNDERLAND LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHIC
SOCIETY. annual soirée of this irsitutit n tock
place on Wtdri..sday
vv. Chambers, of
last, and was presided over by
Edinburgh, who addressed the
at: dif-nee ns.sernhleti at Sorre length and with gr.e at t ifect,
on the crivent:qe of
mg places of innocent reerea-
thni and t niigr t nmery for the humbler classes of society.
Mr. Chambers was follow( d by. Mr. Digby Seymour,
vitro also addrt sst-d the rretling in praise of the insti-
tion. 'Cite mu•ical res,,,urces of Sunderland were called
into play t:) make the scree pass off with more éclat, and
the te...ti%al was ap.,: et,! !at, !y closed with a sA4tuntial
supper in the librs. y, at w filch the Ma) or presided, and
where the healthy of Mr. Chambers and his brother were
tOlifilinti and Artinlp s.:ilk nrtits.leinem

LONDON,

THE WELSH CHURCH.
LLTTbR VIII
TO _THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.

Sia,-Ib,g to refer your correspondent " a inns"
Sir Thomas Phillips's " chap. yin., pp.
317-29, where he will find a brief history of St.
Devid's Col ege, Llampeter.
That institution stands, and has long s•o-yd, a
melancholy monument of the inability of even the
best English Bishop and their Anglicized coadjutors
to comprehend, and to supply the spiritual and mental
requirements of the Principality. Bishop Burgess
was its founder, and his episcopal successor is its
visitor. The college was incorporated in the year
1828, expressly "for the reception and education of
persona destined for holy orders." It received nut
only a high degree of public support, but also many,
noble benefactions from private bounty ; yet in the -

Report of the Charity Commissioners in 1836, the
abeyance, during a series of years, of two of its pro-
fessorships was stated to proceed from "inadequate
resources. '

- - .
Considering the sole and proper object of the insti-

tution to be the home training of Welsh clergymen, it
certainly is a most anomalous and extraordinary fact
that the Professorships of Hebrew and of Logic should
have been retained, while the Welsh Profes.orship was
allowed to remain vacant and virtually abolished ! But

the present inefficiency and poverty of the institution
obviously proceed rather from its own inanity and
perversion than from any real difficulties. The visitor
and resident officers, who are thus nullifying the very
purpose of the incorporation, while Disient is over-
running the land, for want of zealous Welshmen in its
churches, of course must fail in making out a proper
claim on the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, who are,
however, empowered by recent Acts of Parliament to
augment the endowment of St. David's College, Liam-
' peter, at discretion. It is not, therefore, to be won-
dered at, that " this enactment," as Sir T. Phillips
expresses it, "has hitherto continued a dead letter."
'lhe original endowment of this college was pecu-
liarly unfortunate; and, since no one can suppose that
Bishop Burgess acted upon the principle of doing evil
to produce good, his conduct in this instance must b 9
ascribd to that sort of fatuity which cleaves from
generation to generation to English rulers of the
unhappy Welsh Church. Mr. Johnes informs us
(Essay on Dissen', p. 113) that the poor livings
with which this college was first endowed " were
in some instances so completely stripped of
their scanty revenues, that the parishioners
were left without funds to support a resident
minister." In the whole county of Cardigan there
are not more than eight benefices with cure of souls
which are above the value of 150/. a year ; and out of
these eight only two had resident incumbents, %hen
the professors of Llampeter were endowed with four
of them :—Bettws Ttiwan, 2001.; Bryngw) n, 2001.;
Llargoedinor, 4001.; and Penbryn, 3001. "Nothing
could have been more unjustifiable," observts Mr.
Johnes, " than the annexation of the living,' just
enumerated to the College of Llampeter, for in this
very county there are no fewer than nine sinecures,
most of them above the annual value of 2001, which
might have been thus applied without depriving whole
dis.xicts of a resident ministry" (page 214). The
forlorn condition of these injured and impoverished
[wishes may be clearly traced in the tables and notes
of the second part of the Commissioners' Report on
Welsh Education. " Six livings," says Sir T. Phil-
lips' " were granted to this college by King George
the Fourth, namely, Llangoedneor, in Cardiganshire;
Llanedi, 6t. Peter's, Caermarthen ; Llan2eler, in
Carmarthenshire ; and Llandeur, Velfrey, and Nangle,
in Pembrokeshire."

Cd.mrnon sense and strict justice evidently require
that all these misappropriated benefices should be forth -
with restored to their proper parochial uses, and that
the college should at once be sufficiently and liberdly
endowed out of the property placed at the disposal of
the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. This being done,
and each of these benefices bang severally bestowed
upon a pious Welshman ;—the college itself being
thoroughly renewed, its whole administration re-
formed and conscientiously directed to the tfficient
education of useful Welsh ministers, to labour among
their fellow-countrymen,—immense benefits might
confidently be expected to follow such vigorous prtofs
of the energetic revival of the Welsh Church.
Blessed be the statesmen who shall bring such
things to pass.—l am, Sir, &c.,
GORBONIAN.