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I too am glad that you feel so engaged; but let us all recollect the faith and grace it requires to apply the precept, in hope of the promise, to a practical effect on our own hearts. But we are forgetting the flight of time, we must not neglect our engagement to the young people in the other

room.

CHAPTER V.

WHEN We entered the room, we found a fine assembly of children of different ages, from about six to fifteen years. They had just finished their refreshments, and were beginning to arrange themselves according to their own fancy, choosing their seats near to their own favorite companions, and it was not a little curious to see how, by this means, they had unconsciously classed themselves. They all rose at our entrance, and showed the exterior mark of respect for their seniors, whether it were prompted by innate feeling, or inculcated by education.

Welcome, my dear young friends, I said, as I aproached them; but let me survey my little. flock, and endeavor to know each particularly. This is the Good Shepherd's plan, as we read in the 10th chapter of John ;—“ I am the Good Shepherd, and I know my sheep, and am known of mine." So let us, in the name of that Good

Shepherd, know each other. I see William, and Isabella, Maria, Anna, Mary, Louisa, and her brothers Charles and George. I think, too, I see all the party I invited at Mrs. Evans's, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight; and, besides, some countenances new to me may I beg them to be introduced?

Mrs. Evans stepped forward, and said, These are three children of my friends, Mr. and Mrs. Graham.

So I have just nineteen. Now observe, I count you like young sheep; I know you each by name, and a shepherd always desires to keep up his flock to lose none; desirous to give in his account, presenting them to his master. How beautiful is that assurance we have in Scripture, that the Lord Jesus will keep his own. He laid

down His life to keep them, and therefore He will say when He presents them to the Father, "Behold, I and the children whom thou hast given me." Of all that thou hast given me

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have I lost none."

In His Name may we be assembled and held together, for the sacred purpose of learning how to manifest true love to Him!

This easy address calmed the agitation which was visible in some; fearing they knew not what; and those with whom I had before been acquainted looked pleased to be thus welcomed.

In the fourteenth chapter of John, at the fifteenth verse, Jesus thus speaks to his disciples: 'If ye love me, keep my commandments." With

this persuasive plea, how sweet do the commandments of the Lord appear! They are thus laid by the Gospel on the basis of love; and hard is the heart that is not sensible of the difference between this tender injunction, and that which was accompanied with such terrors on Mount Sinai, placing them as the 'condition of life :"Do this and live: but whoso breaketh the least of these commandments shall surely die." In the Gospel, which is the manifestation of free grace and peace, there is no condition attached to the commandments; but obedience to them is named as the proof of love to Jesus. Now, my dear Maria, does not this accord with your motto, "All for love?"

She smiled and said, Yes.

And though you thought that "honor thy father and mother" sounded so cold, you see it is a commandment to be kept for love.

She smiled again.

We may now turn to the twenty-first verse, and we shall see a further explanation, which is to put our love to the proof. We cannot keep any thing, you know, which we do not possess ; we must first have it; and we cannot attempt to keep a command of which we know nothing, we must first know it. So we read, "He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me." When we love the Lord, we shall enquire after his will;-what he would have us to do. We shall receive our instruction, and we shall endeavor to keep it. It is a proof

of the Lord's grace to us when He gives us His commands, and acquaints us with his will; and it is a proof of our love to Him, when we receive and keep His gifts. You wear in your bosom, Maria, a token of your own and your father's mutual love. I dare say you asked for it; he gave it, and you keep it but if, like Anna, we receive a gift, and lose it, it is not like true disinterested love. The commandments of God are a kind of picture of our God; He is holy, just, and good, and they are holy, just, and good; and when we lose them, and would substitute any other thing in their place, we are at once proved to be without love; for it is written in the twenty-fourth verse, "He that loveth me not, keepeth not my sayings."

Now, there is another thing in love,—it cannot be satisfied without a return; therefore, it is promised to them that love the Lord, in the twenty-first verse, "He that loveth me shall be loved of my father, and I will love him." Here is a rich promise, repeated in the twenty-third verse: "If a man love me, he will keep my words, and my Father will love him, and we will come and make our abode with him." But I will ask Louisa a question ;

Is this love to God natural to us?

No, uncle, for St. John says, " Herein is love ; not that we loved God, but that he loved us. We love Him because He first loved us."

True, the source of love is God. "God is love ;" and whosoever He loveth, He causeth to

return His love. And it is written in the second chapter of 1st John, "Whoso keepeth His word, in him, verily, is the love of God perfected. Hereby know we that we are in him." What I desire, my dear young friends, to convey to you in this view, is, that we have the blessed privilege of being under the law to Christ, (1 Cor. ix. 21,) whom to serve is perfect freedom;-all whose commands are in love; and who giveth the principle of love as the spring of the obedience of faith.

Tell me now, dear Mary, what is the fifth commandment?

Honor thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.

Where was it given?

At Mount Sinai, in the wilderness.

To whom was it given?

To all the children of Israel.

And at what time?

Mary hesitated, not being ready with a reply; and Charles modestly said,-Just after they had been delivered from Egypt.

Do you remember what the land of Egypt was called by the Lord?

Do you mean, uncle, at the time IIe gave the ten commandments?

I do.

"The house of bondage,❞—do you mean? Yes; by which I mean to show, that when the ten commandments were given, the Israelites

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