Evil or good may be better or worse
In the human heart, but the mixture of each
Is a marvel and a curse.

The candid incline to surmise of late
That the Christian faith may be false, I find;
For our Essays-and-Reviews' debate
Begins to tell on the public mind,
And Colenso's words have weight:

I still to suppose it true, for my part,
See reasons and reasons; this, to begin:
'T is the faith that launched point-blank her dart
At the head of a lie,--taught Original Sin,
The Corruption of Man's Heart.

* * * * *

CALIFORNIA AS A VINELAND.

It has been reserved for California, from the plenitude of her
capacities, to give to us a truly great boon in her light and
delicate-wines.

Our Pacific sister, from whose generous hand has flowed an uninterrupted
stream of golden gifts, has announced the fact that henceforth we are to
be a wine-growing people. From the sparkling juices of her luscious
grapes, rich with the breath of an unrivalled climate, is to come in
future the drink of our people. By means of her capacity in this respect
we are to convert the vast tracts of her yet untilled soil into blooming
vineyards, which will give employment to thousands of men and women,--we
are to make wine as common an article of consumption in America as upon
the Rhine, and to break one more of the links which bind us unwilling
slaves to foreign lands.

It is a little singular, that, in a country so particularly adapted to
the culture of the grape, no species is indigenous to the soil. The
earliest record of the grape in California is about 1770, at which time
the Spanish Jesuits brought to Los Angeles what are supposed to have
been cuttings from the Malaga. There is a difference of opinion as to
what stock they originally came from; but one thing is certain,--from
that stock has sprung what is now known all over the State as the
"Mission" or "Los Angeles" grape, and from which is made all the wine at
present in the market. The berry is round, reddish-brown while ripening,
turning nearly black when fully ripe. It is very juicy and sweet, and a
delicious table-grape.

Three prominent reasons maybe given in support of the claims of
California to be considered a wine-producing State. First, her soil
possesses a large amount of magnesia and lime, or chalk. Specimens of
it, taken from various localities, and carried to Europe, when
c