morrow,

or even the remainder of his days, is less than nothing, in the estimate of human happiness, compared to the joys of a Christian's hope.

But, in the wise ordination of Providence, the overpowering nature of these high anticipations is relieved by their remoteness; and the effect upon the Christian's happiness is not to raise him to perpetual ecstasy, but to keep up in his mind the glow of perpetual hope.

The last circumstance, which we mentioned, as exercising a powerful influence on human happiness, is the temper. We hear truly good men often lamenting, as the bane of their happiness, an instinctive irascibility. It is often, indeed, united with strong affection and benevolence, and often, alas! destroys the happiness which might be expected from a life of active exertion; not so much from the ill effect it produces on the mind as from the misfortunes to which it leads, and these we are not always able to alleviate by the consciousness, that they are entirely undeserved.

Ill-humor is still more unfavorable to happiness than this irascible temper. It commonly originates in self-dissatisfaction, and leads him, who feels it, to refer the causes of his discontent to the imaginary faults of others, and keeps him in a state of perpetual peevishness. I need not, my hearers, tell you, that, to enjoy this life, it is necessary to possess a temper candid to the faults and mistakes of others, disposed to mutual accommodation, not easily provoked, and willing to see everything, that occurs, in the most favorable light. Every one knows that he, whose disposition is most favorable to his own happiness, is most agreeable to others, and that these common qualities of pleasing and being pleased mutually react upon and generate each other.

But, my friends, the Christian doctrine carries this subject of the temper much further, and represents those dispositions as essential to happiness, which we, in our worldly meditations, are too apt to despise, as if they exposed a man to insult or ridicule. If we read the beatitudes in our Savior's sermon on the mount, we shall find the utmost meekness under injuries, the most unbounded forgiveness, represented as the disposition which leads to happiness. We shall find a blessing pronounced upon that compassionate temper which sympathizes with all the miseries of human life, which shares in all the pains it meets, weeps with the weeping, and mourns with the bereaved. Still further does our Savior bless the patient and resigned disposition which bears, without a murmur, the severest afflictions of life, while we are disposed to envy the hardness of the man who can avoid or repulse them.

Ye proud spirits, who cannot endure the humble genius of the religion of Jesus, weigh well this subject of happiness, before you reject this self-denying system. Experience will decide against you, and vindicate the beatitudes of the sermon on the mount. For us Christians it is enough, that Jesus has pronounced such tempers happy.

My friends, I have attempted to lay open to you the true sources of happiness. Follow the stream, and it will bear you away to the full ocean of eternal bliss. Do you again ask, who will show you any good? Jesus, my friends, calls to you from heaven: Whosoever drinketh of the water of life shall never thirst again.

SERMON XIV.

MATTHEW vi. 13.

LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION, BUT DELIVER US FROM EVIL.

THE life of every man of established religious principles has been a series of struggles. He has found it far more easy to form than to keep his best resolutions; and he has discovered, also, with alarm, that any course of conduct is far more easily depraved than it is amended. Every moral observer knows, also, that mankind do not agree to approve a character which is to-day wicked and to-morrow good, which is habitually scrupulous in one duty and remiss in another; but we give the title of virtuous to that man only, the sum total of whose habits are uniformly on the side of virtue. This is one of the difficulties which make virtue laborious.

Upon further inquiry, we find that no man's goodness is innate and instinctive, but it is to be acquired by labor, and it is also corruptible by circumstances. Sanctification is progressive. Before habits of virtue can be established, temptations must be resisted, pleasures forborne, pains endured, danger encountered, sacrifices made, false steps recovered, and not a few moments embittered by the tears of penitence and remorse.

Nothing truly great is given to mortals without labor; and think you that moral goodness, that most sublime and

imperishable of human possessions, is the offspring of chance? Fortune may make a man distinguished, but it can never make him great; so nature may make a man innocent and amiable, but never virtuous. Neither is virtue that easy acquisition, that a man may secure it by flight from temptation. It is as if you were to expect to acquire a strong constitution by retiring to ease and sloth in the country, or as if you were to seek for uninterrupted health by flying from infection. No, the strength of a Christian's virtue is the reward of frequent resistance and frequent victories. The child must fall often and hardly, before its step becomes firm.

From these remarks, however, do not understand me to mean, that, where there is no temptation, there can be no virtue. The highest degree of moral excellence is found, we know, in that Being who "cannot be tempted with evil." But, my friends, it has appeared best to this allwise Being, who made us, to create us an order of beings whose existence here shall be transitory and probationary. He has given us a nature which is capable of perpetual progress towards himself; and he, that can advance, must be also able to retreat. The higher we soar, the stronger will be our flight; but the lower we creep, the darker and more encumbered is our progress. So insecure is our virtue that we cannot stand firm without ascending to a considerable height, and the rewards of virtue are the more sensible, the more difficult they are of attainment. If this is the case, it does not become us, to complain that we were not created angels, with incorruptible natures and instinctive goodness. The rewards of holiness, in such creatures as we are, are the very consequences of its difficulties; just as an estate of the same value is vastly

more estimable to one who has attained it by his industry than to him who inherits it from his ancestors.

But God, who has placed man in what may be called an enemy's country, has provided him with every auxiliary. He has not left him to roll darkly down the torrent of his fate. Precepts, example, promises, threatenings, honor, shame, suffering, reward, and every variety of means and motives, are provided, from the first hour that the mind discovers any intelligence, to train it up to holiness and heaven. You may choose your weapon from the whole armory of God. In the language of Scripture, you may "gird about your loins with truth," protect your heart "with the breastplate of righteousness," and have "your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace." Then, with "the shield of faith," "the helmet of salvation," and "the sword of the spirit," you may be expected to" endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.”

It shall be my present object, to direct my remarks chiefly to the young and inexperienced. I shall first ascertain the true meaning of the words, "Lead us not into temptation;'

Secondly, point out some of the peculiar temptations of the young;

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Lastly, offer some motives and considerations which may serve to enlighten and fortify the inexperienced mind.

In reading the phrase, "Lead us not into temptation," it should be remembered, that it was common with the Jews, and, indeed, with all the oriental nations, to refer to the immediate agency of Deity every change in the appearance of nature, and every action of voluntary agents. How far this is philosophically or religiously correct, it is