time in fervent prayer, in the vital energies of a warm piety, and place our reliance on God under all the evils that can possibly befall us in our pilgrimage. He careth for us. Let us beware therefore of being either over-anxious or over-righteous. No wisdom and no happiness is to be found in extremes; no, not in the extremes of religion or virtue.

And here let me observe, that the evils which urge the desponding sinner to despair, are often imaginary; the whims of caprice, the day-dreams of idleness, and the humours of discontent.

Amidst all our devotion, which should be constant and fervent, I must recommend a due attention to the ordinary affairs of life, and occasionally to its innocent amusements, the charms of elegance, the graces of the fine arts, and the innocent pleasures of polished society. Industry, manual industry, an attention to some art or science; some employment, useful or ornamental, has a wonderful effect in ventilating the mind, and preserving the very soul in a state of health. Dejection of spirits, or what is called by the delicate, nervousness, with all its sad effects, is more frequently occasioned by idleness and inactivity, than by the pressure of any real evil. The mind stagnates and becomes putrid, and a real evil has sometimes been salutary in causing exercise. The weeds of peevishness and ill-humour grow up in the indolent uncultivated mind, like nettles and briars in a neglected garden. The evil spirit sows tares where wheat is not allowed to vegetate. How seldom do we hear of suicide among the honest and industrious poor? The refinements of life are confined to the rich, the exalted, and the philosophical; and so are some of the greatest evils of life, false delicacy, a satiety of enjoyment, the languor of superabundance,

a difficulty to be pleased, universal dissatisfaction and weariness of existence. They who will not employ themselves in any useful undertaking, and who have wearied themselves in the pursuit of vicious pleasure, are, of all men, the most likely to say, in the words of the text, There is no hope; but we will walk after our own devices, and we will every one do the imagination of our hearts. Tired with the sameness of life, satiated with pleasure, their senses dull and worn out before the time, their fortunes impaired, their characters lost, they are ready, with blasphemous audacity, to curse God and die. They know not who will show them any good; little thinking, from their want of religious principles, of the lively pleasures which the grace of God can excite in the heart of man, independently of all external circumstances, riches or want, youth or age, glory or obscurity.

Let us, who see their error, paint to ourselves its dreadful consequences, and avoid their example. Let us, at every return of the cheerful daylight, with unceasing diligence, while the breath is in our nostrils, employ ourselves in the service of God, and then go forth cheerfully to exert our abilities in good offices to man. Life was given for these purposes; and when employed for the purposes bestowed, it never will become intolerably irksome. It is surely in itself a most valuable gift. To be made a sentient being, capable of enjoying all the delights of this world, and promised everlasting existence in a better; is not this enough to fill us with all joy and gratitude? What were we before we were animated by a particle of the Divine Spirit? Dust; and to dust the suicide is not only contented, but desirous, to return; without a hope of re-animation. How mean and abject his ideas! The Christian hero dares

to live. The Christian hopes to bloom again, in a perennial spring, after the winter of death-to rise a glorified body in a happier state; but the suicide is eager to return to the dust from which he was taken, and would rejoice if he were certain of annihilation.

Upon reviewing the whole of the suicide's state, we may truly exclaim of him, O wretched in thy life, wretched in thy end, and wretched in thy expectations of futurity!

May the great God, before whom we stand, in whose hands are the issues of life and death, give his grace to all who hear me this day, that throughout life they may preserve cheerfulness and hope, by useful activity, and sincere piety, benevolent affections, and beneficent actions; and that when he, in his wisdom, shall bring their years to their natural close, or take them to himself by an earlier visitation, they may die the death of the righteous, and their latter end may be like his! To them, and them only, who can say with truth, that to live is Christ, to die will be gain! And when our hour approaches, O then may some gentle disease, or gradual decay, without pain, without horror, full of comfort and hope, dismiss our bodies to our safe retreat, with decent rites, beneath the turf in yonder church-yard, or to the dark chambers under the stones of those ailes, where sleep our fathers, our once-loved partners, and our dear departed children! O God, make thou all our bed in our last sickness, and grant that every one of us may, with holy Job, resolve and say, looking up to Heaven with the confidence of children to their Father-All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come!

SERMON VI.

ON THE FOLLY AND DANGER OF THOUGHTLESSNESS.

ISAIAH Xxlvii. 8.-Therefore hear now this, thou that art given to pleasures, thou that dwellest carelessly.

THOSE who are addressed in the text, as given to pleasures, and dwelling carelessly, constitute, it is to be feared, the majority of the human race. Among many who enjoy hereditary affluence, the pursuit of dissipating pleasures appears to be the first object of endeavour, and the principal business of existence. Seriousness is often considered, in the circles of gaiety, as synonymous with dulness. Dulness is disagreeable; and therefore he who wishes to recommend himself to the notice and applause of fashion, is induced to assume an habitual levity, and to divest himself of all taste for moral and religious meditation.

The business of self-degradation is easy. Our natural proneness to fall, facilitates our descent down the declivity. The enemy of mankind certainly cooperates in promoting our wicked purposes, and hence we find that the disciples of the world make a rapid progress in acquiring those accomplishments on which the vain and wicked have agreed to place the highest value. No character is more common than that of the professed man of pleasure, who not only avoids every thing that is serious himself, but treats the seriousness of others with derision.

There are many who fall into a similar carelessness, but whose error is to be attributed to different causes.

Without any vicious principles, or corruption of heart, they have gradually contracted habits of indolence. Thinking is, of necessity, attended with exertion. But they are habitually idle, and fond of the softest indulgences of a supine ease. The slightest exertion is to them, therefore, a real pain. Thus it happens, that they had rather vegetate, or be carried whithersoever the caprice of fortune may lead them, than to have the trouble of thought, or be compelled to adjust the measures of their own conduct.

In consequence of their disinclination and inability to choose rational employments, or manly diversions, for themselves, they passively wait to admit every trifle, and every vice, which accidentally obtrudes itself on their attention. If they preserve their innocence, which is not very probable, it is by chance. The greater chance is, that, though they began with no other fault but indolence, they will end with many dreadful sins. For life cannot proceed fortuitously, without incurring such dangers as render an escape from destruction a real miracle. It is an exact and beautiful similitude, which compares life to a voyage; and however excellent the vessel, if it is left the sport of winds and waves, it must receive injury, and will soon be dashed on rocks, or sunk on quicksands.

I purpose, in the following discourse, to dissuade men from forming a habit of Thoughtlessness. I shall first endeavour to evince, that the truest and most substantial pleasures are those which are attended with thought; in the second place, that profit, as well as pleasure, or our temporal welfare and success, are the consequences of it; and lastly, that, without it, no man can become a good member of society, or a true Christian.

I. First then, the truest and most solid pleasures are such as are attended with thought. It has been