Every man is entitled to seek for as much felicity in this world as is consistent with principle and duty; but a life degraded by sensuality and idleness can scarcely be called life, as it misses all the ennobling pleasures of this world, and all the elevating hope of a world to come. A great and good man devoting his heart, his hand, and his head to the service of God, is the master-piece of the creation; but when the pre-eminence is in everything except piety, how sad the contrast of a talented man's prospects, between this world in which they are so bright, and in another and a far better so hopelessly gloomy! When that learned but unbelieving philosopher Sir Joseph Banks was asked by a friend what his expectations after this life were, he gravely replied, "I shall do my best, and take my chance." If the philosopher had indeed done his best, by examining into Divine truth, it would have been no chance but a certainty of happiness for him. Thus do many, whose acute judgment and intellectual chemistry can find matter of thought and reflection in every other subject, glance vaguely and carelessly at those great concerns in which they have an undoubted and everlasting interest, sauntering onwards through the first stage of an immortal existence, as if life were a pathless waste, without object and without end. "How pleasing were this life of yours, fair ladies," said John Knox to Queen Mary's maids of honour, "if it should ever abide, and then in the end that we might pass to Heaven with all this gay gear!" Life goes on; and as no one ever perceives the grass grow, nor the shadow advance upon the sun-dial, no more do we naturally observe the flight of time, unless leisure and reflection lead us to notice its rapid exit, and to fulfil the great business of life while time and opportunity remain; but, in truth, no frantic maniac in an asylum is more foolish as to the affairs of this life, than the worldly man as to the affairs of eternity. The last comment of Marshal Saxe on his own earthly career was in these words, "I have had a fine dream!" But the dreamer, through even so long a life as his, must awake into eternity; and then, unlike the visions of our sleep, we shall find that life was a great reality, for every instant of which we are solemnly to be made responsible, and that if we merely stroll onwards with no guide but inclination, we exercise no power but that of breathing, no capacity but that of suffering, and our inevitable end must be destruction. As things appear very different by daylight from what they do by candlelight, so do the Christian and man of the world view under a perfectly different medium the pleasures and the duties of existence. The disciple of Christ employs himself in doing good throughout the neighbourhood, in reconciling differences, in studying the customs of mankind, in reading history, and in learning whatever may render him useful or respected. He sees with a sorrowful but indulgent eye the depravity as distinctly as the misery of human nature; but without attempting to deny, he earnestly tries to remedy both the man of pleasure, on the contrary, attends to no misery except the vexations that befal himself; and with a general bad opinion of servants, shopkeepers, and all with whom he has any dealings, he nevertheless denies the doctrine of man's natural depravity. It was a curious instance of positiveness on this point that a learned man, having lately read through a history detailing the whole horrors of the old French Revolution, declared that it had not yet convinced him of the natural depravity of human nature. Yet unwilling as men are to be witnesses against themselves, they cannot but see in whatever is connected with the disposition, the conduct, or the prospects of man, the strong tendency of everything to go wrong, and of nothing to go right. The natural progress of all on earth to be amiss, appears as the only perpetual motion discoverable among mankind. Leave a merry party of children without control to enjoy their holiday, and before many hours they will be plunged in mischief and discord; or hire into your establishment the best set of servants that can be found, all recommended as perfect treasures, and if left without careful judicious superintendence, a very short time will transform the good into bad. How singularly was this evidenced in the household of Hannah More, whose domestics were selected with the utmost circumspection; but, owing to a laxity of superintendence during her more advanced years, the sad result was, as described in her Memoirs, that "every crime was committed in her house, except murder," and she became so completely a prisoner to her own servants, that only by an ingenious contrivance could she succeed in conveying a letter to her friends, which summoned them at last to her rescue! "There's something in this world amiss It was the remark of a very misanthropical author, that there are only two classes of persons in this world, "the found out, and the not found out!"— But there is a third class in those who have found out themselves, who know their own weakness and natural depravity, but who have set their whole hearts steadily and earnestly to seek the Divine aid, in bringing about within their own minds an entire re-action for good, following the excellent advice of Pythagoras, that "every man, when about to do a wrong action, should above all things in the world stand in awe of himself, and dread the witness within him.” Truly conscience is an officer so true to his trust, that once roused he can neither be bribed off his duty, nor begged off, till he has tortured the sinner to agony; and it is at the same time remarkable that a sense of sin is in men of every description. The first token of religion having dawned on the soul with the man of refined education as well as with the ignorant New Zealander, the first spark of life in his soul is attended with the newly-awakened consciousness of guilt. Though all Christians unfortunately live below Christianity, yet there have been in every age a few perseveringly constant in their endeavours to obtain and to benefit by Divine grace, lest, while there is a pardon in their Bibles, there should be none for themselves. Such men, contemplating the immeasurable distance between their own best exertions to be holy, and the model proposed for their imitation, would feel depressed and forlorn in contrasting the mighty task before them with their own utter inability to think a good thought, were it not for the hope derived from Christ's mediation. How truly did the profligate son of Bishop Burnet estimate the difficulty of entering on a life of piety, when he said to his father, "I am going to begin a work of much more difficulty and labour than your History of the Reformation,— being the reformation of myself!” When a breach of amity takes place between two mere human beings, of which the offended person is greatly the superior, his dignity might |