sanctuary shut out the gay visions of earth from your mind, and the influence of public worship steals over your heart, you see it. When you witness the sweet and solemn joy of Christians at their Master's table, you see it. When the Holy Spirit by his quiet illumination has hushed the noise of sinful passions, you have heard his still small voice, saying, "Godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come;" and then you have said in your heart, I believe one is happier, even here, for being a true Christian.

The greater part of your convictions, however, you may say are of an opposite character. More generally you regard religion as a sombre theme, leading to a life of gloom. Yet, you ought to reflect, that you thus regard it just in proportion as you are resolved to indulge in sin, and that the worse men are, the more do they think so. The gospel is not a sombre theme. It brought a choir of angels, with shoutings and songs, down to earth, when our blessed Redeemer was born. It has kindled

joys in human hearts such as no other influence on earth can produce; and it will people the new Jerusalem with ransomed millions, robed in white and crowned with gold. If there is any thing gloomy in its appearance to you, it is because the pure light is obscured by the dusky medium through which it passes when entering your sinful and darkened mind.

Besides, you ought not to forget, that when the conviction that religion will promote your highest happiness even in this life, enters your mind, it enters it always at the very times when that mind is in the best state for perceiving truth. It is a conviction that comes not when mad passion reigns. It finds not its way into the soul when it is excited by ambitious projects, nor when reason is endeavouring to do battle against the restraints of Christianity. It comes when a conscious teachableness pervades the soul. It is felt to be the dictate of serene wisdom. It comes in the hour of calm reflection, when life is thought of as a whole, and when the busy thoughts travel on into eternity. It comes when purposes

of usefulness are formed. It steals into the mind in those reflecting hours when one is convalescent from a dangerous illness. It is a conviction that is known by the company it keeps to be the child of truth. And what shall I say to persuade you further? I can say nothing. You must persuade yourself. Come, my young friend, you understand the subject. You know that the claims of duty and of interest coincide. You have been taught the gospel. Your heavenly Father is ready to forgive your sins, and to adopt you into his family. He calls upon you to consecrate yourself to his service. You must not resist him. He is your God. You are in his hands. He can impart to you blessings, here and hereafter, that shall surpass all your conceptions of possible enjoyment. He can cast you off for ever!

SECTION IV.

DANGERS OF INNOCENT ENJOYMENTS.

GOD is good. He is very good to you, my young friend. I wish it were in my power to give you some just appreciation of the extent of his benignity-of its all-pervading influence. Your heavenly Father desires your happiness. When he contrived your powers of vision, and created the sun, and spread around you scenes of variegated beauty, it was his intention that you should derive enjoyment from these his benevolent arrangements. When he conferred upon you elastic spirits, and provided for their gratification, he had respect to your personal comfort, When he endowed you with a warm and susceptible nature, and placed you in social relations where eye should meet eye, and smile answer smile, and heart respond to heart, he intended all the enjoyment that such objects and relations could secure, and

more than you are likely to derive from them.

In the book of Ecclesiastes, the wise man calls upon you to participate freely in the blessings that are suited to the spring-time of life. "Rejoice," says he, "O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thy heart, and in the sight of thine eyes." Then follows a grave admonition. You are called on to be assured that God will demand a strict account for the manner in which you behave yourself in these circumstances. "But know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment." Some commentators have maintained that the first part of this passage is ironical, and that the design of the inspired writer was the same as if he had said, "Go on, young man, in your reckless career; indulge in all manner of wild excess: but do not forget that you will be called to a solemn and awful reckoning for all your misconduct.” This is the 'commonly received sense of the passage, and may be its true meaning. The interpretation of Grotius is, however, in my