softness in their persuasions, that ill-prepares you for disappointment. Have a care, my friends; the velvet-like paw of a cat conceals talons that are dangerous.

There are rude, unmannerly guzzlers, who take a pride in making themselves at home wherever they go, to the great annoyance of all who are not of the same stamp with them. They who show no respect to others, are utterly undeserving of it

themselves.

There are hard-hearted, callous-minded, moneygetting, mammon-clutchers, on whom a tale of distress has no more effect than a ball has on the stone wall against which it is thrown. Where the soul is absorbed in getting, the heart has little pleasure in giving. These mammon-clutchers form a large family.

There are habitual and industrious Biblereaders, who set a value on the word of God above all earthly things. It is a stronghold where they go for safety; a treasure-house where they obtain riches, and a never-failing source of wisdom, encouragement, doctrine, reproof, and correction in righteousness. If you know any of this class, keep up your acquaintance with them.

There are poetical sentimentalists, who revel in the beauties of creation, and prefer worshipping God in the green fields on the sabbath, to meet

ing in his house with his people. Their sentiment may be fine, and their poetry excellent; but their piety is of a very doubtful character. If we truly love God, we truly desire, whatever may be our infirmities, to obey God, "not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together," according to his word.

There are proud and supercilious sceptics, who affect to pity simple-minded Christians, preferring pride and destruction to humility and peace. They feed on husks, and refuse the fatted calf; they sow the wind, and reap the whirlwind; and they live without the hope of eternal life, and lay up thorns for a dying pillow. I am afraid that the number of this class is on the increase.

There are mercy-loving men, who practise kindness to man and beast, and refrain from treading on a creeping thing. Mercy is a glorious attribute! freely have we received of it, freely let us bestow it. A friend of this sort, in a shadowy hour, is as balm to a rankling wound.

There are ill-natured and imperious churls, who are more willingly employed in giving pain than in imparting pleasure. They have no bowels of compassion, tenderness, and mercy; but love to reprove, to condemn, to afflict, and oppress: "The instruments of the churl are evil," Isa. xxxii. 7.

There are compassionate spirits, whose charity

is without judgment; the semblance of woe is enough to call forth their pity. With them an impostor in rags is always more successful than a poor woman decently clad, or a distressed man in a whole coat. I have half-a-dozen people in my eye while I make this remark.

There are unstable, whining, weak-headed changelings, who are not to-day what they were yesterday, nor will they be to-morrow what they are to-day. As well may you desire the weathercock on the church steeple to keep to one point, as expect them to be steady in their purposes. The less you have to do with friends of this kind the better.

There are narrow-minded men, ay, and women too, who have humanity enough to do a deed of kindness, but not generosity enough to abstain from upbraiding the receiver of it. With one

You

hand they give, with the other they smite. never hear the last of any act they perform. For a pennyworth of goodwill they exact a pound's worth of acknowledgments. Their little drops of honey are mingled with much wormwood and gall.

There are grateful spirits that, come good or ill, are always "singing of mercy." To them the heavens declare the glory of God, and the earth is full of the goodness of the Lord. A spirit of this kind is worth a sea full of sapphires!

There are prating old men, who talk much about themselves: often are they grave when they should be gay; frequently do they give advice to their neighbours abroad, while they stand in need of it at home; and continually, while they appear to others as strong, wise, and good, do they feel themselves to be weak, ignorant, and sinful. Come, come, I have hit at last upon something so much like my own character, that I must stop a while, and muse upon it. If any thing that I have brought forward is suitable to your case; if, in this budget of odds and ends, you should find a cap that will fit you, put it on and wear it a while for the sake of Old Humphrey.

ON TERMS USED IN WAR.

WHAT a continual holiday of the heart, what an unceasing jubilee of the spirit would it be, if mankind would always dwell together in peace and love! But the time is not yet. While sin is alive, sorrow will never die; and, therefore, though our paths are thronged with countless mercies, we must not expect them to abound with thornless flowers.

That it is an advantage, nay a duty, to look on the sunny side of things is clear; and yet there are so many sources of grief and distress, that a thinking man can hardly avoid, now and then, walking in the shade, afflicting himself with regret, and shrouding his spirit with melancholy reflections.

I was musing, the other day, on the many forms of expression that we meet with, and read over, without emotion, as things of course, though they involve every thing that is dreadful to human nature. Among them I was calling to mind some of the phrases which are used in reference