fresh departures. There are a thousand doors of access to the heart,-conversation, books, incidents, means of grace, all the five senses; and passengers are busily thronging in and passing out at every door. Some of these passengers are bent on doing mischief, on soiling the chambers, and throwing them into disorder; some on doing good, and setting things to right; some are questionable; some, though much fewer than is generally supposed, indifferent. Now will any precaution, short of watchfulness over the persons allowed to enter, avail to keep such an house in order? No! we must require testimonials that those who claim admittance are respectable. The sentinels must be at their posts in the fortress, and demand the password from all who cross their beat; or the general will lay his schemes in vain, and the garrison will be well victualled in vain, and the poor soldiers will fight and bleed in vain. Bravery, and wisdom, and good supplies, will all be of no avail, unless active steps are taken, to see that traitors are not prowling about the camp, ready to fire the fortress, to open the gates, or to suggest treacherous counsel. As a matter of course, to dismiss the figure, unless we keep a guard and narrow outlook upon our hearts, we may find at any moment that we have "entered into temptation," that is, have entertained it with the will, that we are fairly launched on the slippery incline which leads, it may be, to a very grievous fall. What various and rapid movements take place in our minds in the midst of a warm and animated conversation! Can there be any security for us unless we watch and question them as they arise? This moment our vanity is piqued; at another a desire to say something smart at the expense of charity, or something witty at the expense of reverence, or something entertaining at the expense of truth, or something coarse at the expense of purity, runs away with us, and we are far on our road towards sin,-if indeed we have not already arrived there, before we can pick up the rein and check the steed. Then we are

He gives to His Word on this occasion, that manysidedness of truth, for which all His words are so remarkably distinguished, and which so contrasts with the one-sidedness of mere human teaching: "Watch and

pray, that ye enter not into temptation." The sentinel must be at his post, no doubt, and must be wakeful at his post if the city is to be kept; but, nevertheless, "except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain." Man must give his exertion, no doubt; but he must never lean upon it; for that would be leaning upon the staff of a bruised reed. Now Prayer is, or ought to be, the expression of human dependence upon God,-the throwing ourselves upon His protecting Wisdom, and Power, and Love. And therefore, when Our Saviour counsels us to unite prayer with watching, He counsels us to throw ourselves upon God, under a sense of our own weakness and total insufficiency. And surely there is enough in what has been said respecting the difficulty of keeping the heart, to engender such a sense of weakness. This throng of thoughts which is continually passing in and out, how shall we dream of examining, trying, judging them all, except by a special Divine interference in our behalf? Divine power can qualify a man for any thing; but nothing short of Divine Power can qualify him for a task so onerous as this. To God, then, let us commit the keeping of our souls, in the most absolute selfdistrust. And if this self-distrust is any thing short of absolute, we may expect that constant falls will attend our best endeavours, whose effect, if God bless them, shall be to beat us thoroughly out of this fault. It is a great attainment to be able honestly to say to the Lord, really and deeply meaning what we say: "Lord, I am quite unable to keep my heart myself, and have proved myself so by many humbling falls, in which my adversary has made me bite the dust; but Thou art able to keep me from falling, and to present me faultless before the presence of Thy Glory with exceeding joy; and to Thee therefore I commit the

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keeping of my soul, simply watching, as Thou hast bidden me, and leaving all the rest to Thee.”

He who can say this shall have Christ dwelling in his heart by faith; and this indwelling shall be a sure preservative against evil thoughts; and in that heart, though agitated on the surface, there shall be a peace which it has never known before.

In the inn of Bethlehem there were many going to and fro, and much hurry and disquietude, while caravans were unlading or making up their complement of passengers, and the divan presented a spectacle of many costumes, and resounded with wrangling, and barter, and merriment. But in a stable hard by there was a tender joy too deep for words, and a stillness of adoration which seemed to shut out the outer world; for Mary had brought forth her Firstborn Son and laid Him in the manger, and her heart and that of Joseph were full to overflowing, and angels were gazing down from above on the mystery of the Holy Incarnation.

The soul of man is a noisy hostelry, full of turmoil and disquietude, and giving entertainment to every vain and passing thought which seeks admittance there. But when Christ comes, and takes up His abode in the heart, He reduces it to order and peace; and though it may move amid the excitements and confusions of life, yet hath it an inner stillness which they cannot disturb or destroy; for the King of Peace is there, and Peace is the purchase of His Cross, and the last legacy of His Love and His ancient promise to His people; for so it is written,-" He hath made peace through the Blood of His Cross;" "Peace I leave with you; My peace I give unto you;"-" Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee, because he trusteth in Thee."

CHAPTER IX.

THE HIGH PREROGATIVE OF SUFFERING.

"Verily, verily, I say unto thee, When thou wast young, thou girdedst thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldest: but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not. spake He, signifying by what death he should glorify God. And when He had spoken this, He saith unto him, Follow Me."-JOHN xxi. 18, 19.

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In these words Our Lord predicts the death of St. Peter. In his old age the Apostle was to be crucified, made to stretch forth his hands upon the transverse beam of the cross, and girded (or lashed round the waist) to the instrument of torture by a cord. Tradition says that he was crucified, at his own request, with his head downwards; in that case, the girding, or tying tightly, to the cross would probably be necessary, by way of keeping the body of the sufferer in its right position. In the ordinary mode of crucifixion, to which Our Blessed Lord was subjected, the body rested, not, as is often erroneously supposed, upon the hands and feet, but upon a seat projecting from the middle of the cross; but when the cross was inverted, the body would have no such rest, and it would then become necessary to fix it in another manner by a tight ligament. This is in all probability the reference of the words, "another shall gird thee," though perhaps some will prefer to see in them nothing more than an allusion to the binding of the Apostle previously to his being led away to

execution.

But putting aside their original and literal meaning, the words lend themselves very well to a secondary application. They may be regarded as a striking parable of human life in its two great periods of youth