and an Oberlin, a Tuckerman and a Fry, standing at such high elevation above their compatriots, but by continuous acts of kindness and self-devotion, begun and persevered in till generous social love became part of their moral nature, and the last horrors of a dungeon or the dread infection of loathsome disease were light in comparison with the joy of benefiting and blessing man? In that charity which is never niggard of its gifts is the sway of habit peculiarly evinced. Giving liberally to benevolent or religious institutions, or to the more private succour of the unfortunate, becomes completely by habit the impulse of our spirits, stimulating the heart of sympathy in which the principle of charity originated. Those who have much experience in raising funds for philanthropic or for more directly religious objects, will soon discover that there are beings, not always the most opulent, whose hearts ever respond to the call on their bounty,-beings, it may be, whose conscious selfdenial must precede the gift, but who so apportion their income as to enable themselves to indulge in the greatest of all luxuries to the Christian, the luxury of doing good. Their welcome smile, their outstretched hand, assure you that, so far from considering you in interceding for their charity an intruder on their kindness, they are obliged to the friend who will point out to them the means of most judiciously contributing of their store. The principle of giving, according as God has blessed them, in his service and to his children, lives in their bosom with all the intensity of a yearning desire, which needs gratification, and they must seek out objects of benevolence and create a sphere for spreading gospel truth as it came from the lips of Jesus, with all its glorious light and liberty, rather than not share in the godlike office of rendering others blest. Have you not, on the contrary, sometimes met with those who shrink from all generous sacrifices, and whose hand never opens at the sight of real want, however urgent the claim or importunate the demand? The force of that habit, which is not after Christ, has so environed them in its meshes, that it has R steeled their hearts against all the sorrow-stirring incidents of humanity. Instances are on record of beings who, though perfectly convinced that duty demanded the offering of sympathy, were so spirit-cramped and fettered, so totally the manacled slaves of their perishable wealth, that they were powerless to execute the dictates of their reason. It was said of a gentleman, well known in his day in the walks of literature, who had acquired a large fortune by unintermitting care and a series of parsimonious savings, that, though sensible of the plenitude of the plea which might be laid before him, and confident that his funds were abundantly ample to meet the call, he would yet invariably entreat his friends to withdraw humanity's petition, saying, "Do not ask me for anything, for I cannot give." And omnipotent habit, which has such unbounded influence in cherishing the growth of the personal virtues and the highest graces of the social, the benevolent affections, shall it have less cogency in the culture of the devotional affections? This, its most important sway and power, I wish more particularly to lay before you,-to entreat you to question with me if the devotional spirit, man's highest privilege, can be framed and nurtured by other means than by habitual and frequent communion with our Father in heaven, than by real prayer and supplication ascending from our heart's altar unto Him?-to question with me if we can attain to elevating views of the character of God, and seek after, till we possess, the love which shall impel us to bring affection's tribute of obedience unto Him, without oft-recurring contemplation of his glorious attributes and perfections, and of the blest filial relationship in which we stand to Him, our all-gracious Parent? Men, with a poor intellectual pride, are sometimes found who speak disparagingly of the benefits of secret prayer and of other means of grace, as if, gifted with minds of superior strength, they had risen to a mental altitude far above the need of such helps to spirituality. Shallow dreamers! Devotion's blest reality, its heavenly aid, it has not been yours to experience, and argument from analogy is against you. You have not sought the life-giving power of prayer, or you would have discovered that the devotional character can be formed by no different law than by that which moulds all other characteristics of our nature-I mean the power of gradual acquisition, of habit. Acknowledge this power, and the voice of immortality invests with a tone of imperative command each hallowed call to those religious rites which are the divinely-ordained medium for the attainment of that piety which should be the spirit's native atmosphere. As well might you expect to ascend some mountain's snow-capt pinnacle without cautiously winding your way to its lofty summit, as to share the affections of the child of God without complying with the conditions on which alone his happy devotional frame can be acquired. When we read of "the excellent spirit" that was in Daniel, of his resolution in defence of his holy faith to endure even unto death, we might have inferred, had Scripture not mentioned the fact, that, according to the custom of his nation, "he kneeled three times a-day and gave thanks before his God." When our thoughts turn to the entire devotedness of the Saviour, we see in it the fruits of his hours of watchfulness, of his nights of prayer. But, apart from the many instances recorded on the sacred page, how, think you, were formed the elevated spirits whose names are among the household words, breathed with reverence to those dear to us when we would wish to inspire them with the love of what is holy and devout? You delight to dwell on the piety of a Pascal and a Fenelon-you cannot but be touched by the devotional fervour of a Doddridge and a Watts-you justly value the ardent outpourings of your own Lindsey and Priestley and Channing. It is not for us to invade the private sanctuary in which their heavenward thoughts were nurtured, to enter that closet the door of which their Saviour commanded them to close; yet can there be a doubt but that their lamp of devotion burned brightly because they freely administered to it the pure oil of gratitude and praise and prayer? Utterly unphilosophical is any hypothesis which would give the promise of piety, with all its rich blessings, to those who are wilfully indifferent to the footstool of their Father's throne, to his felt, his more immediate presence. Sooner might the pinionless eagle rise to meet the sun, than the spirit be prepared for its heavenly home without the exercises of piety. See, too, in a fearful contrast, the power of habit when it is suffered to bear sway in criminality, and to drag down to a deeper abyss of infamy the infatuated slaves of vice! The Ahabs, the Tarquins, the Neros of our race, became the monsters of iniquity at which humanity shudders, by yielding themselves to successive gradations in the descending scale of crime, resulting at last in ungovernable cruelty and lust. Yet they were once guileless and innocent infants, on whose mental tablet might have been graven all that was fair and pure and virtuous. How would one who gazed upon their cradled purity have startled at the dark vision of their sceptred lives! Of the tyrant Nero it is recorded, that when a warrant for the execution of a criminal was taken to him for his signature at the commencement of his reign, he exclaimed with a burst of compassionate compunction, "Would to Heaven I had never learned to write !" Such being the almost despotic sway of habit in moulding the character either for good or for ill, can I, my Christian brethren, desire too ardently to induce you to train by habit your souls for heaven-your affections for the God who claims your hearts? Thus shall you live for life's holiest end and purpose. Each passing hour shall render your spirits more meet for a home of purity-your Father's blissful presence : "Till patience, virtue, persevering love, At length have borne the well-tried heart above, And peace descends-such peace as glads the skies.' Professor Brown, when portraying the final result of habit on the virtuous, writes: "There are spirits which even on * Poems by Mrs. Hornblower, p. 203. earth are elevated above that little scene of mortal ambition with which their benevolent wishes for the sufferers here are the single tie that connects them still. All with them is serenity. The darkness and the storm are beneath them. They have only to look down with generous sympathy on those who have not yet risen so high, and to look up with gratitude to that heaven which is above their head, and which is almost opening to receive them.” We may stimulate our zeal to reach this exalted state of purity, to which our Father's voice invites us, by remembering that each single triumph in well-doing, by increasing the facility of the succeeding triumph, acts with accelerated influence in promoting higher achievement, and that, by parity of reasoning, every single instance in which virtue succumbs to temptation will oppose an added obstacle to that high moral and spiritual elevation which we must reach ere we shall hear the Saviour's thrilling gratulation-"Well done, good and faithful servant; enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." Thus can enlightened philosophy grasp the depth of the holy Messiah's teaching, that "he who offendeth in one point is guilty of all." For the mind, by every breach of the Divine law, loses its virtuous self-reliance-its power of determination to persevere. It is self-convicted of unrighteousness. It has wilfully sinned against its God, and how can it look up to Him for help? Perfection of character the reward the Christian has before him-demands the soul's whole strength. The veering course-affections given to earth-will never reach it. It asks for victories on victories, through years of effort. The Christian soldier must resist, steadfast in the faith, till the fervent desire of the apostle be accomplishedthat "the God of all grace, who has called us to his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered awhile, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you," till ye shall be raised beyond the fear or power of failure. Is it said that too much is expected from frail humanity in requiring that it should be ever on the watch-ever on the S |