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holy thought I can originate, of pure sentiment I can cultivate, and of benevolent effort I can perform.

But whilst it is a solemn truth that no man can live unto himself; it is not the truth that the apostle teaches. Some have given it this interpretation: it is a manifest perversion of his holy thought. What he means is, that none of us, christians, live to ourselves-live to self as a voluntary and supreme end. Whilst it is the glory of man's nature that he cannot live unto himself, it is the depravity of his character that he strives to do So. The interests of others-of the universe itself-are nothing to him, in comparison with his own. He is ever receptive, never communicative. He receives all, gives nothing, unless it be with the hope of his contribution flowing back in some form or other, with interest to his own coffers. He would monopolize universal goodness. The laborer may sweat out his life, the shopman wear away his health, the mariner hazard his existence, the warrior dye continents in blood, and tread empires in the dust; his selfish heart would exult in all, if the smallest benefit would accrue to him therefrom. Is there a crime on the black scroll of human depravity that may not be traced to this source? The mighty flood of evil that for six thousand years has been surging its turbid and foaming billows through the heart of groaning humanity, has its fountain down in the selfish soul. Selfishness is the head of all wicked "principalities and powers."

Now the apostle intimates that to "live unto the Lord" is to pursue a course the very opposite of this: It is to live under the presiding power of those universal principles of love which the Lord exemplified in his life, inculcated in his teaching, and brought out in impressive majesty by his death. It is to live as he lived. Did he live unto himself? Did he aim at personal ends? He sought not his own will: "He pleased not himself." He seemed to lose the very sense of self, in the great idea of the world's salvation. He was the incarnation of disinterested love. Every man of the age in which he lived, acted as every man of every preceding age had done-for himself. Each sought his own There were as many conflicting interests as there were men. But He lived for others,-lived for all. He unfurled the standard of a new interest, -an interest which embraced the wellbeing of humanity.

To renounce self-to rally round this standard of universal love to have the soul wrought into sympathy with the mind of Jesus, feeling his love for moral truth and a fallen world, as its mightiest impulse,-is "to live unto the Lord." Thus lived the It was apostle. He caught the benevolent spirit of Christ. "manifest in his mortal body;" it ruled him, it lifted him far above every private consideration. "For me," said he, " to live is Christ." His own life to him was nothing in comparison with the end he sought. When persecution and death in their most terrific forms confronted him, he exclaimed "None of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself that I may finish my course with joy, and the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God."-Rev. D. Thomas.

THE LITTLE PILGRIM.

We have seen many " simple stories" in our day, but have seldom met with one so touchingly truthful, as a very pretty tract of thirty small pages, just sent to us, entitled “The Little Pilgrim.”

We regard it as a far greater curiosity in Psychology, than any of the strangest effusions of that strangest of men, the late S. T. Coleridge, and if poetry may be measured by his own standard, as really more poetical. It is from the pen of a lady whose contributions to our own pages have been for some years favorably known, and whose signature, "L. N.," is anxiously looked for. Though, strictly speaking, it is not a new publication, except as regards its present form, we are tempted to give it almost entire, as it carries with it a moral of great interest in these days of pseudo-education.

Perhaps the most remarkable feature, and that which certainly gives it its greatest value, arises from the circumstance that it is founded on facts; the subject of it, a little girl, having lost herself in the fields while searching for "Bunyan's Wicket Gate."

The story is a simple one. A little child, but without a child's privilege of asking questions, reads the "Pilgrim's Progress," and longs to become a follower of Christian. She takes advantage of the temporary absence from home of her venerable guardians—a grandmother and two maiden aunts, and makes off one sun

shiny afternoon to the hill Difficulty and the Palace Beautiful. After describing very cleverly the position and attainments of the little one, it thus proceeds :

“Her grandmamma told all her friends what very great pains she took to give Maria good principles. Her lectures on these points might all be reduced to five heads; namely, to put every thing in its proper place, to do every thing in its proper time, to keep every thing to its proper use, to be genteel, and to hate the French.

"It will not be surprising that with such training, the perusal of the Pilgrim's Progress, a copy of which had recently been presented to her, gave an entirely new bias to her thoughts. Sorely puzzled was she to guess how much of it might be true, when, one day as they were driving out in the carriage, she saw at a little distance from the road a very handsome house. On some one asking the name of it, she did not hear the answer distinctly, but was quite sure she heard the word Beautiful; and as they directly began to descend a hill, she immediately concluded that it was the palace Beautiful, and that the hill was the hill Difficulty. One great point was now ascertained, that there were really such places; but she began to be sadly distressed when it occurred to her that they were travelling in the wrong direction from what they ought to be doing.

"Oldtown was a town where fewer changes occurred than in more populous and modern places, and Maria scarcely recollected ever to have heard of any one's leaving it. Certainly she had never heard of any one going on a pilgrimage, and she wondered very much how her aunts, who had told her that the Pilgrim's Progress was so very good a book, should have read it without thinking it necessary to take the advice it conveyed.

"The rector of the parish happened to call the very next day at Mrs. Walker's, and as he was going away, enquired so kindly after the little girl, that she was called in from the garden to see him. He asked what book it was she was reading, and when she said it was the Pilgrim's Progress, he stroked her head, and said he hoped she would not delay setting out on her pilgrimage till she was the age of Christian, adding, that a youthful pilgrim was the most interesting object he knew. This last observation was addressed to her aunts, who assented to it, as they did to

every thing Mr. Roberts said, and it confirmed the resolution which Maria had already taken of setting out alone.

"The grandmamma and aunt having gone out to dinner, the housekeeper Mrs. Martha, took the liberty of entertaining a 'select circle' of her own. The party assembled in the housekeeper's room had just reversed their cups in their saucers, as a signal that they did not wish them replenished, when one of the party requested Mrs. Martha's permission to bestow a piece of bread, thickly buttered, and covered with sugar, upon Miss Maria-we presume, as a token of gratitude for keeping out of their way. Consent was obtained, but as Miss Maria was not to be seen, the whole party issued forth into the garden in search of her. Every walk was explored, but in vain; and at last a little gate leading into a wood being found open, the wood was searched, but with no better success. What anguish did Mrs. Martha suffer when she thought how faithfully she had promised not to let the child out of her sight!

"Hour after hour was spent in an unavailing search, and at last the ladies arrived at home, when a scene of confusion ensued. that baffles description. In the midst of it a boy arrived with a little shoe, which he said he thought must belong to young madam: of its being hers, there could be no doubt; and many were the tears shed, over what, Mrs Martha said, was all that now remained of Miss Maria. The boy could give no information as to where this relic was found, for a woman whom he did not know had given it to him to bring to Mrs. Walker, only saying that she had got it from a man, whom she did not know, who said he had found it, but she did not ask where; but she had heard that a little lady had been lost at Oldtown, and she thought, if it was hers, it might be a comfort to her friends to have something that had belonged to her.

"But it is time that we should return to Maria. When she had made up her mind to set out, it was a distressing thought to her that she knew not the direction in which to turn for the purpose of finding the path she was to pursue, and she was determined to ask no one by the way, for fear of encountering Mr. Worldly Wiseman. The road by which they came in the carriage, she knew, did not bring them through the Wicket Gate. She concluded, therefore, that there must be some

different route through the fields to the foot of the hill Difficulty, which she could distinctly see from the garden; so she resolved to make her way through the fields for the chance of finding it; but should she not succeed in getting there by the right path, she would at any rate get there; and when she reached the porter's lodge, at the gate of the palace, she would there ask them to take her back to the beginning of the path, which she was sure some of them would do. She set out, then, expecting every moment to hear her name called from behind her; for she remembered that Christian's friends were clamorous that he should return, and she naturally supposed hers might be so too; but she was firmly resolved to pursue the same course that he did, and put her fingers in her ears, that she might not hear. She had her misgivings, certainly, as to the propriety of leaving home ; but then she thought Mr. Roberts had so distinctly recommended her journey, that her aunts could not blame her very much, particularly as it had not escaped her observation how cordially they had agreed with him as to the necessity of it; and they had so often on a Sunday evening exhorted her to do during the week all that Mr. Roberts had enforced in his sermons, that she thought, or tried to think, that for once they would have no cause to complain.

"She scrambled over or through several hedges, without seeing any thing at all like a path through the fields; still she fancied she was gaining upon the hill, and she thought if she reached the palace, they would allow her to sleep there, although she had not come in by the Wicket-gate, since she really wished to go through it; and she amused herself by wondering whether she should sleep in the same room where Christian had slept, and whether they would give her any armour, or whether it was only worn by men pilgrims. She was interrupted in her reverie by seeing a number of cows running, as she feared, towards her; so she began to run too, and it was not until she had climbed a gate into the next field, that she missed one of her shoes, which had fallen off in her rapid flight-the same shoe which caused so much lamentation at home. She durst not go back to look for it, as a dog was still chasing the cows; but she thought she could manage to walk without it, as the grass was so very soft, and she was sure either Prudence, Piety, or Charity, would give her a new one.

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