artments,
handsomely furnished, where they can find music and books and newspapers
and games, and you stand some chance then of drawing them into the
prayer-meetings. And indeed the direct religious influence of these
associations, while highly important, is nevertheless subordinate to their
work in bringing young men into contact with the various churches of the
community, where the religious appliances are of course more perfect. The
great point is to get them into some position where the churches can reach
them. They will not come to church, many of them, when they first enter
the community. The church has but limited facilities for finding them out
in their stores and boarding-houses and schools; and it may find therefore
a powerful auxiliary in these associations, which bring the stranger youth
where it can bring its influences to bear on them. But for this purpose
the place of rendezvous must be made attractive. We must have
head-quarters as pleasant as the devil's. I hope all of you have read the
article in _Guthrie's Sunday Magazine_ for January, 1866, entitled "_The
house that beats the public house;_" that splendid iron structure in
Colne, Lancashire, built expressly for the irreligious working class.
There are fountains, and pictures, and games, cabinets and books and
newspapers. There are quiet reading rooms, there are refreshment rooms,
even smoking rooms. There is a school room, there are musical
entertainments on stated nights, there are religious services on Sabbath
evenings. "On Christmas eve, 1863," says the writer, "the musicians at one
of the public houses piped for some time, but no dancers presented
themselves, till at length the players themselves adjourned to the meeting
at the Iron School. An attempt to open the theatre that winter failed
through the same influence. The actors, after struggling for a week in the
face of empty benches, left the place in despair."

Here is a clear and successful recognition of the truth that religion has
not such strong alliance with the unregenerate heart that she can afford
to dispense with all legitimate aids and recommendations. The firemen have
their upper parlor in the engine house furnished richly and tastefully.
The drinking saloons are invested with all the attractions that marble,
and glass, and drapery and pictures can give them. One man who appeared
last week before the excise commissioners, said he had expended ten
thousand dollars in fitting up his sa