restrial enjoyments are lighter than vanity itself; how seldom would the hour of folly triumph over that of seriousness! or the Creator be forgotten in the moment of unthinking revelry! how few would profess, as St. Paul -remarks, "that they know God, but in works "deny him!"

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"To pray without ceasing, is in

every thing to give thanks; it is the "will of God in Christ Jesus." It is that habitual piety, exemplified in the conduct of Daniel, making all worldly concerns subservient to its practice; it is that public confession of our faith, "the assembling of ourselves together" in the house of God, which neither pleasure, business, indolence, or various other excuses can procrastinate; it is the hallowed flame of devotion which irradiates, with joy, the prosperous hour, and softens the gloomy period of adversity; it is that communion with

God which allows us to consider Him as a father, a protector, and a friend! it opens those sources of joy and peace in the mind, of which the irreligious can form no adequate idea; it is the origin of pleasures, pure, simple, but ennobling. The works of the creation, the practice of universal benevolence, the delights of human friendship, the happiness resulting from domestic and relative society, are best contemplated and enjoyed by an unvitiated taste, founded on a devotional intercourse with the Almighty. Finally, it is that never-failing gratitude for present blessings, and that humble trust in God for future protection, which Christianity so forcibly inculcates.

Who his ownself bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we being dead unto "sin, should live unto righteousness; by "whose stripes ye are healed *.”

WHOEVER has attentively considered the birth, the life, the sufferings, and the death of our Saviour, and not been elevated to the height of human adoration, nor felt the magnitude, the importance of the subject, the sublimity. of the Gospel precepts, or the perfection of our Redeemer's character, to them all human exhortation

* 1 Pet. ii. 24.

could little avail; nor could such minds be awakened from apathy to the religious feelings of a devout spirit, even "if one arose from the dead.” But to those on whom the sacred light of revelation has pointed its celestial ray, there cannot be a more gratifying retrospect, than to trace the life of him, "who his ownself bare our sins in his (( own body on the tree; that we being "dead unto sin, should live unto righ"teousness; by whose stripes we were "healed."

Of his birth, how affecting was every circumstance! Born, as had been long predicted, in Bethlehem of Judea, we behold the Saviour of the world lying in a manger! and thus from the early day of helpless infancy, not even the comforts or conveniences of life ameliorated the delicacy of his own or his mother's situation; and this resting place, rude and unpropitious as it ap

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peared, was only a transient shelter and protection. The humility of our Saviour's appearance soon militated against the belief, that he was in reality the Prince of peace, and had taken upon himself the human form, to save and to redeem the world. The Jews could give little credit to an event so opposite to their long cherished and ambitious expectations and their subsequent conduct evinced the encrease of their scepticism, and the obstinacy of their opinions. Had regal pomp and terrestrial honors awaited the meek and lowly Jesus, this umbelieving people might have bent their knee in reverential awe, and have proclaimed the "glad tidings "of salvation." But may we not suppose, that God, for the wisest of pur-. poses, veiled the lustre of our Saviour's divinity, that the success of revealed religion might owe nothing to the ad ventitious aid of worldly splendor; that

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