PREFACE. We have now completed the first year of our New Series, and have the satisfaction of believing that many of the ends which we proposed to ourselves are in the way of being successfully attained. Such has been the increase in our circulation, and such the amount of contributions which we continually receive, that we have resolved on making an increase in the quantity of matter presented to our readers. This will be attended with the twofold advantage of enabling us to offer a greater variety of articles to their notice, and of allowing greater space and scope to any one article. It may often be inconvenient to the writer to undertake two papers on a subject, on which, nevertheless, he may have more to say than he can find room for in one, if much restricted in space: to say nothing of the frequent inconvenience of breaking the continuity of a disquisition. This increase in our dimensions will necessarily involve some increase in our price, which, after this month, will be 2s. 6d. instead of 1s. 6d. per number. In our Prospectus of last year we gave some intimation of the principles on which we meant to act. Theology is, of course, the staple material of our magazine; but we have not confined, nor do we mean to confine, ourselves thereto. Little as we value mere literature-the mere epicurean range of intellectual delights-nay, baleful as we think it to those who have no other pursuit, destructive, in such case, as we hold it of all earnest and true-hearted tendencies, we are keenly alive to its merit and use as an accompaniment to a man's particular vocation ; whether as a refreshment after the routine of worldly business; or a temporary diversion from one engrossing study. We have an apostle's injunction to fill our minds with whatsoever things are true, honest, pure, lovely, and of good report; and to the earnest Christian every manifestation, however subordinate, of refinement, of grace, and of beauty, is, in its place, both significant and profitable. We have, therefore, gladly opened our pages to discussions upon literature and art, and trust we shall |