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PUBLISHED BY JOHN MASON,

WESLEYAN Conference office, 14, CITY-ROAD;
AND SOLD AT 66, PATERNOSTER-ROW.

LONDON: PRINTED BY JAMES NICHOLS, HOXTON-SQUARE.

PREFACE.

THE "

copy "for the last month of the year is already in the printer's hands, and we are now called to supply the Preface for the entire volume of the Magazine, and thus, to conclude our editorial labours for 1848. The call reminds us of our annual duty. Once more we have to acknowledge the kindness of the correspondents who have contributed so materially to enable us to furnish our readers, regularly, with a monthly Number not altogether unworthy of their acceptance. We do this with an unfeigned gratitude; fully assured as we are of the value of the articles which have been sent to us, and which we have gladly used according to the intention of the contributors. And as our own labours are continuous,-month after month succeeding to each other, nay, year after year, (we could almost say, if we only regarded our own feelings, and not that regular course of time which is altogether independent of them,) with increasing rapidity,-in returning our customary but sincere thanks for the favours of the past, we must earnestly solicit their continuance for the future.

And we are the rather induced to do this, from our growing sense of the vast importance of the work in which we are engaged, and of the urgent necessity of its accomplishment in the most efficient manner. In the most ordinary times, and only looking at circumstances that never vary, our task is most responsible. We are not appointed to its performance, that we may afford a monthly opportunity of agreeable relaxation and amusement to the many thousands who honour our pages with their perusal, nor even that we should seek to promote their improvement in subjects merely secular. The Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine was originally designed for the spiritual welfare of its readers, for the instruction in righteousness of immortal souls. Our object is the same as that which is proposed by the divinely instituted ministry of the word, though the means to be employed are, in some respects, and as to outward form, somewhat different. We speak thus comparatively; for, substantially, even the means are the same, namely, the communication of TRUTH, whether by direct statement, or by its argumentative defence against the often-changing but always-imposing forms of error. And it is impossible to look back on the events of the

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