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prosperity and mental cultivation. To have the divine attributes of truth, purity, righteousness, and love, reflected in the national character; society adorned with the beauty of holiness and ennobled by the triumphs of goodness; this is a condition, in comparison with which, the objects of worldly admiration, the achievements of science, and the fascinating creations of the imagination, are a vanity. The true glory of a land is determined by the prevalence of evangelical religion within its borders, producing devotion to God and integrity to man; attention to personal and relative duties; sobriety, industry, honour, and truthfulness; conjugal fidelity, filial obedience, and parental love: in short, yielding a measure of the good fruits involved in the comprehensive expressions, "any virtue-any praise." It is the verdict of sacred testimony, that "righteousness exalteth a nation." Hence, under an impression of this truth, patriotism directed by piety will deprecate the abounding of iniquity, contemplate its repression, and adopt means to diminish its prevalence. It will promote the extension of divinelyappointed instrumentalities for the conversion of man, second their action by example, and commend them to the blessing of God by prayer. The amount of ignorance and vice now within the compass of our seas, calls loudly upon all the friends of the national welfare to exert themselves against the evildoers; and while foreign enterprises are properly employing zeal, it may be well to remember, that to further the reign of religion in our own land is efficiently to further the same object in the world at large, and prevent the meeting of our countrymen abroad from being the antagonism of

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discordant elements. Hereby a greater number will be enlisted in the general service, and the evil be diminished which at present exists-that of English depravity, on the shores of China and amid the isles of the Pacific, marring the efforts of English religion.

The love of home, too, under the guidance of enlightened piety, will be directed to the same object, the constitution of the domestic circle into a family of God. Owing, indeed, to the depraved appetite and blinded judgment of man, from which the best of men are not free, the affections are apt to flow in erroneous channels; or if the objects contemplated by them are legitimate in their place, those spiritual attainments which ought to have special regard, are not so sedulously pursued as their importance demands. The care of their own household is chiefly manifested by many in the natural duty of sustentation, in training its members to be skilful artizans and expert traders, and in imparting that knowledge which expands the mind, developes its faculties, and refines its taste. None of these objects are to be neglected, yet, being of inferior moment, they should occupy only a subordinate place in household economy. It should be the chief concern of those who dwell under the same roof, mutually to exhibit and extend the religion which enlightens the understanding, purifies the conscience, changes the heart, sanctifies the affections, and regulates the conductprepares man for his progress through this world with acceptance, and for the highest felicity of which his nature is capable in the world to come-in order that those who are lovely and pleasant to each other in life may not by death be finally divided.

The affections of the Christian are not limited to visible things, or confined to time. It is pleasing to reflect, that besides an earthly home and country, attachment in which he may indulge, and minister thereby to his own happiness and the comfort of others, he has a "better country-that is a heavenly," in prospect, a celestial home; and whatever may be the character of the former, however subject to vicissitudes, and marked with painful features, that of the latter will be a source of ample satisfaction and immutable pleasure to every occupant. It is pleasant also to think, that however he may be separated by the duties of life from the earthly scenes in which his affections centre, and led away from the land of his birth, his relation to the everlasting habitations remains unaffected by the change, and his passage thither may be accomplished with as much ease and triumph from the uttermost parts of the earth, as from his native soil and wellknown homestead.

T. M.

THE EVENING HOUR.

SEE in yonder western sky
Day's bright orb declining ;
See through clouds of every dye
Rays of lustre shining!
Stranger, seek the silent bower,
There improve the evening hour.

Late on yonder meadow's side
Lilies sweet reposing,

Bloom'd in beauty's fairest pride,
Every charm disclosing:
View them now, so lowly laid,
Drooping, dying, disarray'd!

See yon tower, which long has stood,

On its strength relying; Braving every tempest rude,

Every foe defying:

View it now, with ivy wound, Stooping, crumbling to the ground!

See yon tall and stately oak,

Once so proudly rising ;

Rooted in the rifted rock,

Age itself despising:

View it now, by lightning torn,
Down the foaming river borne !

View the stream, which rolls below,
Down the vale descending ;
To the sweets which round it grow
Fresher graces lending :
Soon, in ocean's billows tost,
All its majesty is lost!

View them well, from idle range

Every thought recalling; Ponder on each striking change Round thee still befalling : Ponder on them, thoughtless man, Emblems of thy mortal span!

As the sun, at evening's close,
Down his glories laying ;

As the flower, which sweetly blows,

Soon again decaying ;

Fast probation's season flies,

Man is born, and lives, and dies!

As the tree and turret tall,
Long the eye commanding,
By the hand of time must fall,

Him in vain withstanding;
Mortals' fond but fading trust
Quickly mingles with the dust

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