Wesleyan
Church, 1832-1872.]

In October, 1840, Dr. Ryerson addressed a letter of congratulation to
Lord Sydenham, on his elevation to the peerage. He again referred to
the publication of the _Monthly Review_, proposed by His Excellency. In
regard to the latter he said:--

The publication of a monthly periodical such as I suggested to your
Excellency last spring, appears to me now, as it did then, to be of
great importance, in order to mould the thinkings of public men and
the views of the country in harmony with the principles of the new
Constitution and the policy of Your Excellency's administration,
and to secure a rational and permanent appreciation of its objects,
and merits; and it would have afforded me sincere satisfaction to
have given a proper tone and character to a publication of that
kind. But what I have written publicly in reference to the
principles and measures of Your Excellency's Government has already
been productive of serious consequences both to myself and the Body
with which I am connected.

In the discharge of my ecclesiastical duties, I have to devote
several hours of four days in each week to visiting the sick, poor,
and other members of my pastoral charge, and am preparing a series
of discourses on the Patriarchal History, and the Evidences of
Christianity, arising from the discoveries of modern science, and
the testimony of recent travellers, besides the correspondence and
engagements which devolve upon me in the office I hold in the
Methodist Church. Under such circumstances the assumption by me of
the management of such a periodical is impracticable. I could not
do justice to it, nor to my other appropriate duties. I might, in
the course of my miscellaneous reading, select passages from
established authors, which would be suitable for a miscellany at
the end of each number, to illustrate and confirm the principles
discussed in the preceding pages of it. I might now and then
contribute a general article on the Intellectual and Moral Elements
of Canadian Society; or, on the Evils of Party Spirit; or, on the
Necessity of General Unity in order to General Prosperity, etc.,
etc.; but even in these respects I fear I could not render much
efficient aid, from the exhaustion of my physical strength in other
labours, and for want of the re