to demonstrate the necessity of repentance, and a new mode of spirit and of life.

Since without love we feel no sorrow for having offended, so we cordially seek forgiveness only from those in whose love we have reason to believe. It is the apprehension of the forgiving heart of true love that brings tears into our eyes, on remembering our sins against it. Could Judas have met the eye of Jesus, and felt His love as Peter did, instead of going to his own place, through despair and suicide in the field of blood, his soul would have been drawn more closely to his Lord, while in some secret place he wept bitterly, because the sense of his own treachery would have deepened in proportion as he felt the greatness of his dying Saviour's love..

The most unhappy are the most amiable, if they but know the worth of love. Not those who spitefully make themselves wretched; but those who find themselves out of place, undone, and in despair, and ashamed to look up, because of self-reproach, and because no kindly eye speaks to them. These are they that the Son of God prefers to converse with alone, and to touch with His burning words of love, until their hearts leap up in the light of heaven. Such are fit to feel the divinity of compassion, and respond with a life to the smile of God seen in the Saviour's face, when He says, "Be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee."

CHAPTER XIV.

THE LOVE OF ACTION AND POWER.

THE infant no sooner moves its limbs, and feels that they are moved at its will, than it begins to enjoy itself in the use of its own power, for power is evinced only in action, and every action is a certainty—an advance in positive knowledge. The infantine motive is the motive of all. It is the love of power, or rather the pleasure of self-consciousness in the use of means, by which we obtain outward evidence of our own inward life and of the reality of things, in relation to ourselves. Every voluntary bodily act is an action of mind, in which there are both attention and intention, and, therefore, the very essence of all that constitutes actual enjoyment. This love of action in the use of power is shown in a great variety of manners, but in all its manifestations it appears only either as a desire to influence others or to employ ourselves. Every new exertion of power being so far an extension of our faculties, or a larger realization of our own existence, it is no more wonderful that we love to exercise this power than that we should wish to use our eyes, and help them with the telescope to look further into the heavens. All advancement is due to this love of power. When rightly exercised, it serves to prove that God does not deceive us with appearances, but that by His very nature there is truth in all he has made. Whatever a man contrives to accomplish by new means, or to a greater extent, brings his own spirit more into vital connection with the moving universe, and more out of the region of death. He who first traveled, without fear, sixty miles an hour on a railway, was conscious

of a new kind of life; but the man who invented the steam locomotive that drew the train, containing himself as the mind of the moving mass, was the man who most enjoyed the love of power and of action.

All the delights of discovery arise from our admiration of power, as evinced in the divine disposal of the elements for given purposes; and it is in the nature of the mind, according to its prominent disposition, always to aim at making a practical use of knowledge, by rendering science the minister of pleasure, by presenting new combinations to the senses, and by enabling man to extend and establish his dominion over the earth. Were Napoleon now in his former place, he would summon the lightning to his aid, cause it to open passages through the mountains, and transport his armies on its wings, and the world would admire, while trembling at the power that converts savants into slaves.

So great is our sympathy with the bare exercise of power, that the ambition of tyrants and conquerors inspires a feeling of sublimity, when, with commanding skill, they wield the energies of millions, and so enchant the nations as to make them submit to their caprices. And indeed, it is wonderful that he who led so many thousands to inglorious destruction in Russia, should, at a word, call armies to the slaughter at Waterloo.

Those who do not habitually contemplate the demonstrations of Omnipotence, as seen in creation and in providence, are always ready to be captivated by daring spirits; and those who do not addict themselves to the quiet activities of science and of social commerce, are ever the first to talk of glory, and, under the pretense of defending their own rights, to trample on those of mankind. In short, those who do not worship God, will worship themselves, in the form of some ostensible hero; and, whether it be such a one as Na

poleon, or even that spirit unfortunate" that reigns in hell, they care not, so that he is active and ingenious enough to keep their pride astir, while employing them for his own purposes.

Some men work with their own means, others take advantage of those of their neighbors. Society is maintained by this love of power, but in one class of minds it takes the direction of activity, and in another the desire for possession; the co-operation of these constitutes commerce, and introduces those arts of industry which supply the means of luxury and comfort. But as it is more blessed to give than to receive, so it is happier to be active than passive. It is better to be busy in devising and employing the means of turning nature to advantage, though seemingly reluctant, than to be supplied like a plant without personal effort. All the free creatures of earth, air, and sea, are constrained to exert themselves for the supply of their own wants, and the feeling of necessity which causes exertion is the means of all their happiness. Thus it is also with man; and therefore, if he who is provided with a daily sufficiency without toil, turn not his mind to the consideration of his spiritual progress and usefulness, he must be running riot in iniquity, and studying how he may please himself in the indulgence of whatever taste may happen to predominate, since it is impossible for the soul to cease from action as long as the nerves will obey it. Activity without faith, or a feeling of duty, is the turmoil of hell, and to seek the power of being idle is to court the company of demons, with their torments. The mind will, while in the body, become subject to the body, unless struggling on in the pursuit of truth, it holds dominion over appetite. Unholy, unsocial, and brutal pleasure will debase all man's faculties into bodily passions, if, in the leisure of exemption from labor, his heart and mind are not busied about those nobler objects which

the worlds of nature and of providence offer so freely to our souls. It is not surprising, therefore, that when men of sober and industrious habits succeed in acquiring the means of retirement, and withdraw, it is too often neither with ease nor with dignity; but in fact, they leave all their pleasure in town, with their business, and, not being mentally provided for, they sigh, amid their paradise, for the loss of that cordial with which Mammon sweetened toil; and, finding nothing at hand in which they are fit to be employed, become either hypochondriacal, dreamy, or dangerous in their miserly irritations.

The love of power takes as many forms as there are minds, since every mind possesses something in some measure peculiar to itself, either in its motive or its means. But the aims of men are generally directed according to their social feelings; for whether we seek knowledge, eloquence, or wealth, we usually acquire and employ them only that we may attain a station in society, or an influence among our friends or in our families, that will enable us to enjoy an extension of our individual endowments, by fellowship with others, or by inducing them to act in keeping with our own wishes.

There are, however, misers of all complexions, whose only business is to wrap up their acquirements, and hide them away, as the Indians do their choice gods; and well may they conceal them, for they are but paltry idols at the best. The desire of possession of any kind, like that of gold, merely as money, is a monomania of the hoarding disposition, which gets its own punishment, if not its cure, by depriving itself of the means of enjoyment in the very act of increasing the store.

Thought must precede, accompany, and follow experiment, or industry will be wasted, and we shall make no advance in true observation. Many enjoy