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Preface.

THIS unpretending little volume consists of a series of Discourses, preached in the ordinary routine of the author's ministrations, as Chaplain of the South Carolina College. He has ventured to publish them, because the young men who heard them thought that they derived benefit from them; and as the subject is eminently adapted to the case of the youthful student, it did not seem presumptuous to hope, that what had been useful here, might also be productive of good beyond the walls of the College. The times require some such discussion as that which is here attempted. The author is by no means sanguine, however, of any other success than that which may be found in the cordial approbation of his own pupils. They will accept the work in the spirit in which it has been written; and if it shall have the effect of imbuing their minds with

that generous love of truth, which constitutes the noblest inspiration of the scholar-if it shall lead them to Him, who is the fountain of truth, and to the study of that eternal Word, which is the only infallible message of truth, he will feel that he has not labored in vain, whatever reception his little manual may experience at the hands of strangers and critics. The structure of the sermons may be explained by the circumstance, that the author sustains the double office in the College of a Preacher of the Gospel, and a Teacher of Moral Philosophy. It is his custom to make the pulpit and the lectureroom subservient to each other. With these brief statements he sends the book into the world to speak for itself; and he earnestly prays that He whose prerogative alone it is to bless, and who can accomplish the purposes of His grace, as well by the feeblest as the mightiest instrument, may make it speak with power to the understandings and consciences of all into 'vhose hands it may chance to

come.

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The Ethical System of the Bible.

Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true-think on these things."-PHILIPPIANS, iv. 8.

DISC. I.]

THE passage, of which these words are a part, is an enumeration of the principal duties of morality. The Apostle has been supposed to refer to the different systems which were discussed in the schools of Greek philosophy, analogous to those which have divided the inquirers of modern times. It is remarkable that his language admits of an easy application to the prominent theories of virtue, which have been proposed in Europe, within the last two centuries. One, for example, places it essentially in conformity with truth; another in beauty, corresponding perhaps to the Apostle's honesty; another in obedience to nature and reason; another in disinterested benevolence,

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