A serpent, concealed hitherto in the grass, fixes in his flesh its poisonous fang; the wound is mortal; his life's blood is poisoned; fires intolerable course through his veins. He now repents of his folly; he wishes he had borne the heat of the day. The venom reaches his heart; he thinks of home and friends; his spirits sink, his head swims, his eyes-they close in death. The leaves of autumn are strewn around him, and the place that knew him knows him now no more forever. This is an emblem of the danger of self-indulgence. With alacrity and delight the convert sets out on his journey to the kingdom of heaven. He anticipates the pleasures he will strength to resist; he falls a victim to his folly; guilt and remorse now sting him to the quick. "Fool that I was," he exclaims. "O! that I had con-tinued in the path of duty." It is too late. Wretched man, self-indulgence has proved his ruin. The disobedient prophet fell a vićtim to self-indulgence, when he turned aside to "eat bread and drink water,' and a lion met him by the way and slew him. The five foolish virgins, also, who "slumbered and slept,' when they ought to have been watching, fell by the same insidious foe. They awoke in outer darkness, and found the door of the kingdom of heaven fast closed against them for ever. meet with on his arrival. He thinks not of the dangers of the road, nor "If any man will be my disciple," of his own besetments. For awhile said the Savior, " let him deny himself, he makes rapid progress. By and take up his cross, and follow me." To by persecution and trouble come upon them who by patient continuance in him; he grows weary. He looks well-doing seek for glory, and honor, round for some other way, that has and immortality, eternal life. "He in it less of danger and difficulty. that endureth to the end, the same shall Soon he discovers one apparently be saved." more easy and pleasing to flesh and blood. For awhile he stands in doubt; his love of self-indulgence overcomes him. "He will not endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ." He enters the forbidden path. Now all seems pleasant and delightful. The pleasures of the road lull to sleep his spiritual senses. Sin, now like a serpent, assails him; he has now no "Deny thyself, and take thy cross, Is the Redeemer's great command! Nature must count her gold but dross, If she would gain this heavenly land. "The fearful soul that tires and faints, And walks the ways of God no more, And makes his own destruction sure." Surely thou didst set them in slippery places; thou castedst them See here portrayed, a gently-rising ground, A youth lies sleeping on the roseate bed, It is by ascending "a gently-rising | modifications. It allures, that it may ground," and not by overleaping the abrupt precipices, that the youth attains his dangerous position-his bad eminence. "Sin is first pleasing, then easy, then delightful, then confirmed; then the man is impenitent, then he is obstinate, then he resolves never to repent, and then he is damned." Sin possesses a peculiar faculty to deceive; this is true of sin in all its betray and destroy. It meets the youth with smiles only, that it may plunge a dagger more surely in the heart. It promises to the gambler, the robber, and murderer, wealth, pleasure, kingdoms. But having filled the cup of hope to the brim, with cruel mocking it is exchanged for the chalice of despair. Sin adapts itself to the various de man. praved appetites or propensities of To all its votaries it promiseth the pleasures of this life. But "the wages of sin is death." To all likewise it offers perfect security, crying peace, safety, when sudden destruction is at hand. As sin is thus deceptive in its promises, and fatal in its results, so also is it in its influence on the human mind. It blinds the eyes, it hardens the heart, it sears the conscience, it fascinates the imagination, it perverts the judgment, it gives a wrong bias to the will, it effaces from the memory recollections of the beautiful and the good. In a word, it throws the pall of the grave over the whole man, and hides from his view, his guilt, his danger, and his immortality. The man is now wrapped in the mantle of "carnal security;" he is insensible to all around him. The path of sinful pleasure is strewed with Plutonian flowers. They breathe the odor of the pit, stupifying to the senses. The bewitching music of the great enchanter, casts the soul into a deep sleep. It is like the sleep of the grave. Perhaps he is dreaming of happiness that he will never enjoy; perhaps of home, that he shall never behold; or of friends, whom he shall embrace no more forever. In the midst of his dreams of delight, the bow of the Almighty is strung; the arrow is made ready, the dart of death is uplifted, ready to fall upon the unconscious victim; the pit has opened its mouth to receive the prey. Nothing but the voice of God can arouse him from his lethargy. "What meanest thou, O sleeper! Arise and call upon God, if so be that thou perish not. Awake, thou that sleepest; and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light." "Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth; walk thou in the ways of thy heart, and in the sight of thy eyes. But know, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment." "Ye sons of Adam, vain and young, And cheer your hearts with songs and wine; "God from on high beholds your thoughts, His book records your secret faults; * "The dust returns to dust again; THE THREEFOLD DEMON, OR ENVY, HATRED, AND MALICE Where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work. Lo! where the threefold demon stalks along, In the engraving is represented a threefold demon striding forward, with sullen pace, in order to torment mankind. On her back she carries a pack of slanders; under her arm a quantity of poison; thus she is thoroughly furnished for her hellish work. To show that from without proceeds her pain, She is chewing the flesh of a viper, which thus introduced in her system, poisons her heart's blood, and disorders her eyesight. In her left hand she grasps a thorny staff; this is to show that she torments herself voluntarily. She banquets on the destruc tion of human happiness. See! how | Eyed them askance, and to himself thus 'plain'd she tramples upon character, and scat-'Sight hateful, sight tormenting!'" ters to the four winds the reputation of others. She leaves behind her, and following in her train, a gathering, blackening tempest, surcharged with the "fire of hell," soon to burst upon mankind. There is great propriety in representing the union of envy, hatred, and malice in one individual. Envy itself is defined to be "pain felt and ma lignity conceived at the sight of excellence or happiness." But when envy conceives, it brings forth hatred; and hatred, when it is finished, brings forth malice. We have a striking example of this union in the conduct of Joseph's brethren toward him. First, "they envied him," probably on account of his superior excellence; then "they hated him," in conse quence of the partial conduct of Jacob their father; and finally, in their malice "they sold him" for a slave. This emblem represents Envy, Hatred, and Malice united in one person, and forming a being of extraordinary malignity. There are many such in human shape-demons wearing the mask of human form, beings whose eyes are pained at the sight of either excellence or happiness, whose heart is corroded with the poison of envious and malicious thoughts, self-tormented with the thorns of their own creation-beings who never smile but at the tears of others, whose hellish A still greater example occurs in joy consists in the wreck of human the conduct of the Jews toward the happiness, and whose only music is blessed Redeemer, in whom all exthe voice of lamentation and woe-cellences met, when "for envy they beings of Satanic inspiration. They delivered him" into the hands of the are always well furnished with slan- Romans; they envied him for the ders, and never want for opportunity splendor of holiness that shone around to vent them. In this they copy after his path. In their hatred they extheir great father, the prime enemy claimed, "He hath a devil," and in When beholding the orig- their bloodthirsty malice, "they cried inal of the first human pair in the out the more, saying, Let him be crubowers of Eden, ere he effected their cified." overthrow, of man. If envy, malice, hatred reigns, And binds my soul with slavish chains, |