and confinement had produced; and then the brave spirit yielded for a moment: Jerome lost his steadfastness, and, worn out by care and for a moment overcome by the fear of a terrible death, he agreed to recant his doctrines, to renounce Wickliff and Huss, and to declare publicly his approval of the sentence which the Church had pronounced against him. Then the enemies of truth did sing, and the corrupt rulers of the Church, who feared somewhat to add to the troubles in Bohemia the additional excitement which the murder of one so influential as Jerome would be sure to cause, did exult. But their triumph was but short-lived. Before Jerome regained his liberty he had regained his steadfastness: his firmness had returned; he had renewed his strength; he had repented of his weakness; and he rose up before the Church of Rome clothed with a moral majesty which defied her power and braved her fires. He recalled the recantation he had made; he re-asserted his attachment to the doctrines of Wickliff and Huss; and declared his readiness to die for the truth he held and taught.

Jerome had many friends. He demanded a public trial before the Council. After much delay, this was granted. On the 23rd and 26th of May, Jerome defended himself before the Council from seven in the morning until one in the afternoon. His resources as a theologian, his fluency of utterance, his graceful diction, his powerful appeals to reason and to Scripture, amazed but could not convince his determined judges. On the very testimony of his foes we are informed of the power and influence of the Reformer's speech. After defending his principles and having overthrown the fallacies of his foes, he turned to speak of himself, to plead, his enemies expected, for life and liberty; but he had risen above the power of death, he had laid himself upon truth's altar, and was fully prepared to meet its kindled fires. In a dazzling strain of eloquence he brought up, one after another, those men who among Pagans, Jews, and Christians had fallen victims to false accusations, and particularly to priestly hatred. He spoke

of Socrates, Seneca, Boethius, John the Baptist, Stephen, and, last of all, John Huss; enthusiastically dilating on the latter as a man known to him only by his zeal for piety and truth, one who had drawn down upon himself the persecutions of a worldly-minded clergy only by the faithfulness with which he rebuked their corruptions. He ended by declaring that there was no one of his sins he more painfully rued than that of having suffered himself to be moved, by the fear of death, to acquiesce in the condemnation of that saintly confessor of the truth. He took back all he had said concerning Wickliff and Huss. He declared that he assuredly should not be the last of those who would fall victims to the cunning and malignity of bad priests; and, turning round to his judges, he exclaimed: "I trust in God my Creator that one day, after this life, shall see you preceding you and summoning you all to judgment, and then you must render your account to God and to me, if you have proceeded against me wrongfully."

Jerome

This speech, so bold, so clear, so distinct in the principles it laid down and the position of fearless antagonism to the Papacy which it expressed, placed Jerome beyond all possibility of escape or hope. His death-knell rang out in that glorious defence of truth and conscience. Henceforth each hour bore him swiftly to the flames. But although the minds of his judges were made up, such was the profound impression which his speech had made in Constance that they hesitated to slay him until a period of forty days from the time of his defence. For forty days Jerome was tempted by men and harassed by the shadows of death. But Samson had regained his giant might. He neither fainted nor feared. The day of execution arrived. The sentence of the Council waited accomplishment. The martyr was prepared. The stake was erected, the faggots gathered to the scene of blood,-all was ready: and then he went forth to die. He went forth singing hymns and psalms of holy triumph. This was his hour of victory: like his Lord he conquered by dying. For some reason the

officer charged with the execution proceeded, after chaining his victim to the stake, to light the fire behind the martyr's back. This caught the eye of Jerome, and he immediately called to his executioner to light the fire before his face, "For," said he, "if I had been afraid of this fire I should not have come here." After delivering a short address to the crowd on the reason of his condemnation, he said, as the flames rose around him: "Into thy hands, O God, I commit my spirit." And again, as the deadly torture fastened upon his limbs, he said: "Lord God have pity on me, forgive me my sins, for thou knowest I have sincerely loved thy truth." The long lambent flames now roared and blazed about him: he was passing away. Now and again, as the fire parted, could his lips be seen to move in prayer; and then a few charred bones were all that men saw of Jerome of Prague.

"Thou knowest that I have sincerely loved thy truth." With what majesty do these dying words invest that scene of agony and blood! To what a moral altitude does the martyr rise who can in death thus appeal to the Searcher of hearts how much greater is such a spirit in its winding-sheet of flame than those who had hounded him to his death; and what an appeal from the cruel decision of an earthly council to the Great God did these words contain.

In after years Germany seemed for a time to sink back into darkness; but the greater Reformer, Martin Luther, appeared, and from much of the Fatherland the darkness passed away three hundred years ago; still Bohemia groans beneath the weight of the priesthood that murdered Huss and slew Jerome; but the light is breaking over her. Sadowa, I trust, will do more than give German ascendancy to Prussia, a Protestant power; it has broken the Concordat from Austria's neck, and will, we trust, be followed by the overthrow of that Church which murdered Jerome of Prague. THOMAS GUTTERY,

THOUGHTS FOR LITTLE MINDS.

ON THE ASS.

"The ass,

Dull as he is, selects unerringly

The nutritive from out the harmful weeds."

PARTRIDGE.

THERE are two varieties of this animal, the wild and the domestic. We will entirely pass by the former, and shall try to tell you some few things about the "domestic ass." This animal is so common and well known tha' it is quite needless to describe its form and appearance. It takes its place as No. 5 of the domestic animals, and ranks next to the horse in usefulness. In Eastern countries the ass is much larger and finer in every respect, and has always been far more esteemed on the continent of Asia than in Europe. In the early part of the world's history the ass, to a certain extent, answered all the purposes of the horse; and to the present day is highly valuable for domestic purposes. Many poor but industrious persons keep a donkey when they could not obtain or keep its nobler compeer, the horse.

Asses are enumerated as constituting part of the riches of Abraham, Jacob, and Job; the latter having "one thousand she-asses as a portion of the latter blessing given to Job by the Lord God of Israel. Moses records that Anah, a Horite prince, fed the asses of Zibeon, his father. In the 1st book of the Chronicles the divinely-inspired penman tells us that in the time of King David asses were so valuable that an officer was appointed to superintend the breed, &c.: 66 even Jehdeiah, the Meronothite, a prince of Israel." During the time Israel was governed by judges it was evidently thought a mark of distinction to ride upon an ass. We gather this thought from the brief notices given by the inspired historians. Jair, the Gileadite, "had thirty sons that rode on thirty asses' colts; and they had thirty cities, which are called Havoth-jair unto this day." Again, an

other judge, Aldon, son of Hillel, "had forty sons and thirty nephews that rode on threescore and ten asses' colts." Mephibosheth, the grandson of Saul, rode on an ass; so did Ahithopel, the prime minister of David, and the greatest statesman of that age. "The fashion of this world passeth away:" time rolls on; men change their manners and customs. What would be said if Mr. Gladstone, our prime minister, the greatest statesman of this age, should be seen riding on an ass en route to St. Stephens for a parliamentary debate! Fancy the crowd following him through Parliament-street, by Westminster Abbey, up to the proper entrance to the House. Even in those early days, as the fascinating pleasures of a court began to exert an influence, the manners and customs changed; the noble horse was used instead of the patient ass: but down to the reign of Jehoran, the son of Ahab, the Shumanite, in 2nd Kings iv. 8-24, a woman of high rank saddled her ass and rode to Carmel, the residence of the prophet Elisha, to announce to him the death of her son and to ask his assistance.

The preference for the horse, the nobler and statelier animal, to the ass began to increase as the court increased in magnificence. Probably this was at the accession of Solomon to the throne of Israel. This rich and splendid prince collected a very numerous stud of the finest horses that Arabia and Egypt could furnish. This is certain, that after the return of the Jews from their captivity in Babylon the great and the noble rode either on the mule or the horse. The ass was then assigned to the common people,and it soon became a mark of meanness and poverty to appear publicly riding upon it. For want of attending to this change in Jewish customs some commentators have subverted the meaning of our blessed Saviour riding into Jerusalem upon an ass; a circumstance which, as foretold by Zechariah and recorded by Matthew, represented the meekness and humility of our blessed Lord and Master. From its long domestication the original country of the ass cannot be determined: probably it was a native of Syria, Palestine, and the plains of Meso