Page 4 Advertisements Column 4

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume V, Issue 201, 26 August 1870, Page 4

| Bankruptcy Act. —We take the following from the Post of Saturday : — The Bankruptcy Bill, which had come down from the Council, was read a second time after some debate. The bill is simply an amendment of the present acts, but a consolidation is promised next session. The bill makes the filing of a declaration of inability to meet engagements an act of bankruptcy, and it provides that, except by the consent of the majority of creditors, no bankrupt shall get a discharge without paying 10s. in the pound. Mr. Webster opposed the bill as being cumbrous and unfair, and Mr. Buuny moved, and Mr. Borlase seconded the amendment, in favor of its beiug made that day six months. This being negatived after some debate, Mr. Haughton moved that the bill he referred to a Select Committee, aud on this a division took place — Ayes, 19 ; Noes, 26. The bill was therefore ordered to be committed next week, but as it is a very voluminous measure, it is more than likely that it will be numbered with thelnuocents at the end of the session. What Boston Clergymen think of Charles Dickens. — On the Sunday following the death of Charles Dickens, the Rev. Mr. Dunn, of Boston, of the Beach Presbyterian Church, preached a sermon entitled, "Vanity of Vanities," in which he attempted to show that the life of the great genius has been a failure. In the course of his sermon he said — " Mr. Dickens may have written many noble things, in which we rejoice, but he has written many a line which is deadly poison." Whether the sermon was due to a pardonable ignorance or an unpardonable wish for a sensation, or a mixture of both, nobody knows and nobody cares, for Mr. Dunn is a man of no mark. The true sentiments of Boston towards Charles Dickens were well presented yesterday (19th) by the Rev. W. R. Alger, in the Music Hall, his subject being "The Sword aud the Pen ;" with a pleasing tribute to Charles Dickens. In alluding to the power of novelists and secular writers, he said that in the pages of the theologians the name of Christ is constantly used, but it stood for a character of hideous cruelty. There was more of real Christianity and self-sa-crificing love in Dickens' description of the child in the London Hospital than all the pondrous tenets written by John Calvin. A high place among those who have distinguished themselves as the best instructors of mankind must be assigned to Charles Dickens. His moral virtue and tenderness was extraordinary, and he excelled as a teacher of piety and virtue ; a proof of piety was manifest in every allusion he made to God, or the unknown and infinite. The happier spirit in which he contemplated all objects was a central consideration in his whole literary life. His kindly pen photographed all with a touch of beauty. He never dipped his pen in gall, but in tears and his heart's blood. The vast number of characters with which he peopled an enchanted world of life are remarkable for their truthfulness of repreresentation and morality of effect. Such a man puts the human race in his debt. He emancipates and enriches by the touches of his genins. What sunshine he shed into the homes of men ; what a flood of happiness he dispensed to the four quarters of the globe! Standing beside the dead Dickens, he would say ; Tread not on him. Peace ! The man is noble, and his fame folds in the orb of the earth. If he did not believe the orthodox creeds of the church, he had rendered a great service to Christianity by unveiling the fallacies of the Church. He had never written one word of attack upon morality or religion, and he should not bo subject to the mi-erable standard of the sectarian conyenticle. Dickens did not write for the applause of the world ; hesaciificed for truth. In his writings he direcily followed the examples of Christ, who took little children in his arms. Every touch from the genius of Dickens in reference to a child was extremely beautiful, and has borne fruits in softening the hearts of his rev lers. Dickens is dead, but his works will live. those passages which nobody could read without, tears, will always receive love and honor. QoEEit thing is an insurance policy. If I can't sell it, I can-eel it ! and if I can-eel it, I can't sell it ! !