reason leads the way; from all that lies in the remoter distance, she turns away dazzled, and repelled, discerning nothing but an interminable expanse of light and glory. These which we have been considering, will, we may rationally believe, be among the principal sources of enjoyment to the good in the future life. There may be others of a different character, concerning which we cannot form conclusions with any confidence. The certainty of the future life, of its joys and of its sufferings, is a truth which we should render familiar by frequent contemplation, and under the influence of which our whole characters ought to be formed. If we may rely at all upon the deductions of reason; if the voice of nature be not uttering falsehood; if the religion of joy and hope be not an imposture; if heaven and earth have not conspired to deceive us; and all around us be not a dream and a delusion; then it is certain that we have not risen into existence to pass rapidly through this short life, without purpose or satisfaction, and then to sink into nothing again. Our destiny is of a far different and far higher character. 'This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.' There are tendencies in our nature to which if we yield, we may become engrossed by the objects immediately before us; we may estimate them out of all proportion to their relative value; and the most important things future may seem to us shadowy and unreal; as by him whose eye should have been always limited to some narrow circle, the mountains and cities in the distant horizon might be confounded with the clouds. But to yield to these tendencies is to be miserable; commonly in this life, certainly in the other. What is to come, will come, whether or not we expect it or are prepared for it. The far-sighted wisdom which regards the whole of our existence is the only guide, which will not soon lead us from the path of happiness; and the conduct, which best secures our future good, is far more nearly allied to that which affords most present enjoyment, than our follies or our passions would suffer us to believe. We have seen in what the happiness of the future life consists. Rich and glorious as is the prospect, it is still a prospect of such happiness as cannot be felt, unless we have prepared ourselves for its enjoyment. This preparation is the business of life; it is the purpose for which we are placed in this world. It consists in the faithful discharge of all our duties; in the improvement of our intellectual faculties, and our moral sensibility; in enlightening our minds by the study of our religion; in repressing our sensual appetites; in subduing our bad passions; in virtuous self-denial; in purity and temperance; in honesty and justice; in cultivating our social affections; in forming habits of benevolence; in regarding the happiness of others in all our conduct; in habitually considering how we may best employ our faculties, and our means of usefulness, for the good of our friends and our fellow-men; in viewing the common interest as our own; in constantly regarding ourselves as the children and the creatures of God; in looking up to him with resignation, gratitude, love, and reverence; and in making his will the rule of all conduct. Superstition and fanaticism may fancy that they have discovered some easier path to heaven, than that of a good life. It is a wretched, and most pitiable delusion. There is no other, and there can be none easier. We may entertain, likewise, very false notions of the nature of repentance. Repentance is something much more than mere sorrow for past sins. Mere sorrow for past sins, considered by itself, is without value or efficacy. True repentance is a change of character from bad to good. The sensualist must become pure and temperate; the selfish man must become generous and disinterested; the angry and malignant must become gentle and benevolent; the profane must become serious and devout." But changes of this sort are not, in the common course of events, to be effected in a day, or a month, or a year; far less in the few last days of a misspent life. No, it is impossible to form an unnatural union between vice and happiness. If we would attain the blessedness of heaven we must pay the price of the purchase; we must become the servants of that master whose service is perfect freedom. It is by patient perseverance in well doing, that we may attain to glory, honour, and immortality. Collections. The Christian Judge. 'A CHRISTIAN Judge, in a free land, should with the most scrupulous exactness guard himself from the influence of those party feelings, upon which, perhaps, the preservation of liberty depends, but by which the better reason of individuals is often blinded, and the tranquillity of the publick disturbed. And if the preservation of calmness amidst the strong feelings, by which a Judge is surrounded, be difficult, is it not also honourable? And would it be honourable, if it were not difficult? Why do men quit their homes, and give up their common occupations, and repair to the tribunal of justice? Why this bustle and business, this decoration and display, and why are we all eager to pay our homage to the dispensers of justice? Because we all feel, that there must be somewhere or other a check to human passions; because we all know the immense value and importance of men, in whose placid equity and mediating wisdom, we can trust in the worst of times; because we cannot cherish too strongly, and express too plainly, that reverence we feel for men, who can rise up in the ship of the state, and rebuke the storms of the mind, and bid its angry passions be still. 'He, therefore, who takes the office of a Judge, as it now exists in this country, takes in his hand a splendid gem, good and glorious, perfect and pure. Shall he give it up mutilated, shall he mar it, shall he darken it, shall it emit no light, shall it be valued at no price, shall it excite no wonder? Shall he find it a diamond, and shall he leave it a stone? What shall we say to the man, who would wilfully destroy with fire the magnificent temple of God, in which we are worshipping? Far worse is he, who ruins the moral edifices of the world, which time, and toil, and many prayers to God, and many sufferings of men have reared; who puts out the light of the times, in which he lives, and leaves us to wander amidst the darkness of corruption, and the desolations of sin. 'A Christian Judge, who means to be just, must not fear to smite according to the law. Under his protection we live ; under his protection we acquire; under his protection we enjoy. Without him, no man would defend his character, no man would preserve his substance. Proper pride, just gains, valuable exertions, all depend upon his firm wisdom. If he shrink from the severe duties of his office, he saps the foundation of social life, betrays the highest interests of the world, and sits not to judge according to the law. 'The topicks of mercy are the smallness of the offence, the infrequency of the offence, the temptations of the culprit, the moral weakness of the culprit, the severity of the law, the errour of the law, the different state of society, the altered state of feeling, and, above all, the distressing doubt, whether a human being, in the lowest abyss of poverty and ignorance, has not done injustice to himself, and is not perishing from the want of knowledge, the want of fortune, and the want of friends. All magistrates feel these things in the early exercise of their judicial power; but the Christian Judge always feels them, is always youthful, always tender, when he is going to shed human blood; retires from the business of mer, communes with his own heart, and prays to Him, who has redeemed him, that he may not shed the blood of man in vain. 'The whole tone and tenour of publick morals is affected by the state of supreme justice. It extinguishes revenge, it communicates a spirit of purity and uprightness to inferiour magistrates; it banishes fraud, obliquity, and solicitation, and teaches men, that the law is their right. Truth is its handmaid; freedom is its child; peace is its companion; safety walks in its steps; victory follows in its train; it is the brightest emanation of the Gospel; it is the greatest attribute of God; it is that centre, round which human motives and passions turn; and Justice, sitting on high, sees genius and power, and wealth and birth, revolving round her throne; and teaches their paths, and marks out their orbits, and warns with a loud voice, and rules with a strong arm, and carries order and discipline into a world, which, but for her, would be only a wide waste of passions.'-Rev. Sidney Smith; [a Sermon before the Judges in the Cathedral of York; March, 1824.] 360 The Object of Preaching.-On the Unity of God. The Object of Preaching. 'No man, who deserves the name of a faithful minister, preaches novelties. The object of preaching is to remind mankind of what mankind are constantly forgetting; not to supply the defects of human intelligence, but to fortify the feebleness of human resolution; to recall mankind from the by-paths, where they turn into that broad path of salvation, which all know, but few tread. These plain lessons the humblest ministers of the Gospel may teach, if they are honest; and the most powerful Christians will ponder, if they are wise. No man, whether he bear the sword of the law, or whether he bear that sceptre, which the sword of the law cannot reach, can answer for his own heart tomorrow, or can say to the teacher, even of the plainest truths, "Thou teachest me in vain."-Rev. Sidney Smith. On the Unity of God. [Translated from a Letter of Locke to Limborch.] The question you propose to me reduces itself to this; How may the Unity of God be established? Or in other words; How may it be proved that there is but one God? 'To resolve this question, it is necessary to know before we come to proofs of the Unity of God, what we are to understand by the term God.-The common idea of God entertained by those who acknowledge his existence, and, as I think, the only true one, is that he is a Being, infinite, eternal, incorporeal, and all perfect. Such an idea being once entertained, it appears to me very easy thence to deduce the Unity of God. In fact, a being who is all perfect, or, so to speak, perfectly perfect, can be only one, because a being all perfect cannot want any of the attributes, perfections, or degrees of perfections, which it imports him more to possess than to want. For otherwise he would be, so far, not entirely perfect. For example, to have power is a greater perfection than to be without it,-to have more power is a greater perfection than to have less; and to have all power, that is, to be omnipotent, is a greater perfection than not to have all. These positions being established, two beings all |