obeying it punctually, finds its power strengthened by such obedience; and submission becomes easier for the future, until at length it is yielded habitually.

How, then, since rules, if discreetly used, are so serviceable, shall we proceed in the formation or adoption of them? Now, just as a little experience of our own physical constitution puts us into possession of the amount and kind of food, the amount and kind of air and exercise which suits us best, so a slight experience of the spiritual life, if it be but an earnest one, soon teaches us what restrictions it is important to lay upon ourselves, what should be our leading resolves, and what form and length of devotion is suitable and expedient for us. Minds are almost infinitely various; and according to the character of our own mind must be the discipline we allot to it. Some persons can profitably go through much longer devotions than others; because some are naturally more recollected, and some more dissipated by external things. Persons in rude health and high spirits will need external mortification in things innocent, to a degree which might be extremely prejudicial to those in whom the tone of animal life is always feeble. Persons called to much active business must study how they may make their devotions very short, very frequent, and very fervent; those who have leisure will be able to consecrate a larger portion of it to direct acts of worship, and will find their account in doing so. Then, as to the desirableness of frequent Communion, this will vary much with the temperament and circumstances of each individual, as well as with his progress in the spiritual life, and the quiet opportunities which he can manage to secure beforehand. Let each man do in this matter as in his conscience he thinks to be best for himself, and, according to the Apostolic rule of love, neither judge his brother as a formalist, because he partakes often of that most blessed Sacrament, nor despise him as irreligious, because he finds a rarer celebration more profitable at present. Again, as to almsgiving, some rule surely must be felt by all of us to be urgently

needed; and here, especially, the form and shape which the duty will take will be almost infinitely various. Let each man only make sure of securing by his practice the principle, which is that God has a claim upon a certain fair proportion of our annual income, which portion is literally not ours but His; and that to withhold from Him such a proportion, independently of the dishonour done to Him thereby, is as likely to be prejudicial to our spiritual interests as the withholding from Him a portion of our time for the exercises of devotion. Let this principle be deeply settled in the mind; and then the details adjusted honestly in accordance with it. Though the subject is one which defies, more than any other, all attempts at a general rule, the method prescribed by the Apostle to the Corinthians may perhaps be found serviceable, and in many cases would be quite practicable, that of laying by in reserve a certain portion of money, as our income accrues. The doing this regularly and punctually might very likely free the mind from those perplexing considerations, as to whether we are doing our duty in this matter of almsgiving, which are apt at times to harass all earnest and thoughtful Christians. And to be rid of perplexities is a great point gained towards holy living. It is not easy to grow in grace, while the mind is in a tangle, and the will in a state of hesitation and unsettlement.

Finally, (and passing over without notice many points which might be touched, but which the mind of the reader must supply,) specific resolutions are of the greatest service in the Spiritual Life. They must be framed upon the knowledge of our weak points and besetting sins; and it is well every morning to draw up one or more of them, after a foresight of the temptations to which we are liable to be exposed, and the circumstances by which we are likely to be surrounded. Let it be remembered generally that nothing is so likely to destroy that recollectedness of mind, which is the very atmosphere of the Spiritual Life, as unexpected incidents for which we are in no wise prepared, and

which often stir in us sudden impulses of almost uncontrollable feeling. We cannot, of course, foresee all such incidents; but still there are many of them, which, from a survey of the day, we may think likely to arise. Let us arm ourselves for them, when they do come, by a holy resolution, which will take its shape from the peculiar nature of the temptation offered,-a resolution. perhaps to busy ourselves in some useful work, and so divert the mind, or to give a soft answer which turns away wrath, or to repeat secretly a verse of some favourite hymn, or only to cast a mental glance on Christ crucified, which indeed is the most sovereign remedy against temptation known in the spiritual world.

In any case let our rules be such as may be easily and cheerfully observed, remembering that we are to serve God in the newness of the spirit, not in the oldness of the letter. Let the object be to make them a help, not to convert them into a penance. And let their inferiority and subserviency to the principle on which they are founded be always kept in mind. Let them not be easily dispensed with when once made; and yet let there be no foolish superstitious scruple about dispensing with them when real necessity arises. Oh, who shall teach the one-sided mind of man the true middle path between the bondage of observances (which is the bondage of Judaism), and that spurious (so-called) freedom, which affects to disdain self-discipline, and refuses to acknowledge itself under the Law to Christ! God will show us the path, if we will not lean to our own understanding, but follow, with the simplicity and docility of children, the guidance of His hand.

CHAPTER VII.

OF THE MISCHIEF AND DANGER OF EXAGGERATIONS IN RELIGION.

"Let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith." ROM. xii. 6.

LORD BACON Somewhere compares religion to the sun, which has two contrary effects upon live and dead animal substances. Live animal substances,-the living body of man, for example, the sun invigorates, and cheers, and promotes the functions of life in them. But in dead animal substances the sun breeds worms, and turns them to corruption. Similarly, he says, religion invigorates a sound mind, and cheers a sound heart, while in a morbid mind it breeds noisome superstitions, and miserable scruples, and grotesque, and even monstrous, fancies; the fault however not being in religion, but in the diseased mind, which is subjected to its influences. Such is the thought of the great philosopher, if these are not the very words in which he has expressed it.

We have only to survey the history of Christianity, to see how eminently just this comparison is. The Gospel, as taught by Our Lord and His Apostles, is holy, pure, divine, transparently clear, radiant alike with the glory of God and the happiness of man-of that there is no doubt; yet what twists has the mind of man contrived to give it, so that in some forms of Christianity you can hardly at all recognize the original draught, as it came from the Divine mind! What follies, fancies, superstitions, licentious doctrines, have founded themselves-not justly, of course, but with a most perverse ingenuity-upon the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament!

This has arisen, not from any fault or shortcoming in the Scriptures themselves (God forbid! His Word

is, like Himself, perfect), but from a certain morbid tendency in the human mind to caricature truths presented to it. I believe we cannot express the tendency in question more exactly than by calling it a tendency to caricature. A caricature is the likeness of a person, in which the artist has caught some of the leading points of the countenance, but has so unduly exaggerated them as to make the whole likeness absurd and grotesque. There is always a point of resemblance in a caricature, or persons would not know for whom it was meant; but the point is excessively magnified and thrown out of all proportion to the other lineaments, or people would take it seriously, and it would cease to be a caricature, and become a portrait. Now it would be very interesting to consider every heresy which has hitherto arisen, and see how in each case it has been a caricature of some one point of Christian Truth,—an exaggeration by which the fair proportion of the Faith (of which St. Paul speaks in the Epistle to the Romans) has been distorted, and a single passage of Scripture or a single class of passages, brought into undue prominence. We will take one or more instances from those

heresies which are better known. The truth upon which the Quaker founds his whole system, is that the New Dispensation is spiritual. No truth can well be more vital, more important, or more apt, through the subtle encroachments of formalism (a sin which is at all times waylaying us), to be dropt out of sight. It is quite necessary for all of us to turn round every now and then, and ask ourselves whether we are properly awake to it. That the law, under which Christians live, is the law, not of a written table, nor of a written book, but "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus," written on the fleshy table of the heart; that in place of a code prescribing or forbidding actions, our Legislator has given us a code of Beatitudes on certain states of heart and feeling; that in the Gospel morality what we do goes for comparatively little, and what we areour motives and intentions-for every thing; that each movement of the heart is judged by Him who reads