tiful organization; channels for the vital juices to flow in; some to nourish the stalk; others to provide for the flower and prepare the seed; other instruments still, to secrete the nutriment that flows up from the soil, and to deposite and incorporate it with the plant; and altogether, a mechanism more curious than any, perhaps, ever formed by the ingenuity of man. And yet there are questions here, which the profoundest philosopher cannot answer. What is the principle of life,--without which, though the whole organization remains, the plant dies? And what is that wonderful power of secretion? No man can tell. There are inscrutable mysteries, wrapped up in the foldings of that humble spire of grass.

Sit down now, and take thy pen, and spread out thine account, as some writers have done, of the insignificance of human life. But wilt thou pause a little and tell me first, how that pen was formed wherewith thou art writing, and that table whereon thy tablets are laid? Thou canst tell neither. Wilt thou not pause then, when the very instruments thou art using, should startle thee into astonishment? Lay thine hand where thou wilt, and thou layest it on the hiding bosom of mystery. Step where thou wilt, and thou dost tread upon a land of wonder. No fabled land of enchantment ever was filled with such startling tokens. So fraught are all things with this moral significance, that nothing can refuse its behest. The furrows of the field, the clods of the valley, the dull beaten path, the insensible rock, are traced over and in every direction, with this handwriting, more significant and sublime than all the beetling ruins and all the buried cities, that past generations have left upon the earth. It is the handwriting of the Almighty!

In fine, the history of the humblest human life is a

tale of marvels. There is no dull or unmeaning thing in existence, did we but understand it; there is not one of our employments, no, nor one of our states of mind, but is, could we interpret it, as significant-not as instructive, but as significant, as holy writ. Experience, sensation, feeling, suffering, rejoicing; what a world of meaning and of wonder lies in the modes and changes and strugglings and soarings of the life in which these are bound up. If it were but new, if we had been cast upon "this shore of being" without those intervening steps of childhood that have now made it familiar ground; how had we been rapt in astonishment at every thing around, and every thing within us!

I have endeavoured in the present discourse-perhaps in vain to touch this sense of wonder: to arouse attention to the startling and awful intimations, to the striking and monitory lessons and warnings of our present existence. And if some of the topics and suggestions of my discourse have been vague and shadowy, yet I am ready to say; better to be startled by the shadows of truth, than to sleep beneath its noontide ray better to be aroused by the visions of a dream, than to slumber on in profound unconsciousness of all the signs and wonders of our being. Oh! that I could tear off this dreadful common-place of life, and show you what it is. There would be no want then, of entertainment or excitement; no need of journeys or shows or tales to interest us; the every-day world would be more than theatres or spectacles; and life all-piercing, all-spiritual, would be more than the most vivid dream of romance; how much more than the most eager pursuit of pleasure or profit!

My Brethren, there is a vision like that of Eliphaz, stealing upon us, if we would mark it, through the

vails of every evening's shadows, or coming in the morning with the mysterious revival of thought and consciousness; there is a message whispering in the stirred leaves, or starting beneath the clods of the field, in the life that is everywhere bursting from its bosom. Every thing around us images a spiritual life; all forms, modes, processes, changes, though we discern them not. Our great business with life is so to read the book of its teaching; to find that life is not the doing of drudgeries, but the hearing of oracles! The old mythology is but a leaf in that book, for it peopled the world with spiritual natures. Many-leaved science still spreads before us the same tale of wonder. Spiritual meditation, interpreting experience, and above all, the life of Jesus, will lead us still farther into the heart and soul and the innermost life of all things. It is but a child's life, to pause and rest upon outward things, though we call them wealth and splendour. It is to feed ourselves with husks, instead of sustaining food. It is to grasp the semblance, and to lose the secret and soul of existence. It is as if a pupil should gaze all day upon the covers of his book, and open it not, and learn nothing. It is indeed that awful alternative which is put by Jesus himself; to gain the worldthough it be the whole world-and to lose our own soul.

IX.

THAT EVERY THING IN LIFE IS MORAL.

WHAT IS MAN THAT THOU SHOULDST MAGNIFY HIM, AND SET THINE HEART UPON HIM; AND THAT THOU SHOULDST VISIT HIM EVERY MORNING, AND TRY HIM EVERY MOMENT?-Job vii. 17-18.

THAT we are 66

tried every moment,"-is the clause of the text, to which I wish in this discourse, to direct your meditation. By which, in the sense of the passage before us, is not meant that we are continually afflicted, but that we are constantly proved and put to the test; that every thing which befalls us, in the course of life and of every day, bears upon us, in the character of a spiritual discipline, a trial of our temper and disposition; that every thing developes in us feelings that are either right or wrong. I have spoken in my last discourse of the moral significance of life. I propose to speak in this, of the possible moral use and of the inevitable moral effect of every thing in life. My theme, in short, is this; that every thing in life is moral, or spiritual.

There is no conviction which is at once more rare, and more needful for our improvement, than this. If the language of Job's discontent and despair in the chapter from which our text is taken, is not familiar to many, yet to very many, life appears at least mechanical and dull. It is not such, in fact, but it appears such. It appears to be mere labour, mere business, mere activity. Or it is mere pain or pleasure, mere gain or loss, mere success or disappointment. These

things, if not mechanical, have at least, to many minds, nothing spiritual in them. And not a few pass through the most important transactions, through the most momentous eras of their lives, and never think of them in their highest and most interesting character. The pervading morality, the grand spiritual import of this earthly. scene, seldom strikes their minds, or touches their hearts. And if they think of ever becoming religious, they expect to be so only through retirement from this scene, or, at least, through teachings and influences and processes far removed from the course of their daily lives.

But now I say, in contradiction to this, that every thing in life, is spiritual. What is man, says Job, that thou visitest him every morning? This question, presents us, at the opening of every day, with that view of life, which I propose to illustrate. That conscious existence which, in the morning, you recover from the embraces of sleep; what a testimony is it to the power and beneficence of God? What a teacher is it, of all devout and reverent thoughts? You laid yourself down and slept. You lay, unconscious, helpless, dead to all the purposes of life, and unable by any power of your own ever to awake. From that sleep, from that unconsciousness, from that image of death, God has called you to a new life; he has restored to you the gift of existence. And now what meets you on this threshold of renewed life? Not bright sunbeams alone, but God's mercies visit you in every beaming ray and every beaming thought, and call for gratitude; and you can neither acknowledge nor resist the call without a moral result. That result may come upon you, sooner than you expect. If you rise from your bed, with a mind undevout, ungrateful, self-indulgent, selfish--something in your very preparations for the