SERMONS-DUE REFERENCE TO BE HAD TO THE CUSTOMS OF

SOCIETY.

WE would distinguish between pastoral and social visiting. Nor do we see any necessity why the pastor should forego the usual pleasures and proprieties of the social circle. We would not be fastidious here. Our Saviour performed his first miracle at a festive and highly social occasion. But while the Saviour thus revealed his true character amid, perhaps, the exuberance of hilarity, if not mirth, so a minister on any social occasion where he may chance to be a guest, should never lose sight of his true character; and on all social occasions in which a minister may appropriately engage, the circle should never be broken up without proposing prayer. Nor would we deprive the minister's family of the privilege of choosing their own associates with

becoming propriety, just because it becomes the head of that family to become all things to all men. The law of caste, to a greater or a less degree, obtains in all conditions of society; and as it respects intimate social intercourse, not always without propriety. But the preacher, as a pastor, belongs to no caste or class; he is neither an aristocrat nor a democrat. The most refined and the most elevated in society will only esteem him the more highly by knowing that his earliest attentions are given to those in the lowliest walks of life. If they estimate his character properly, they will expect to find him the most frequently where his services are the most needed. He is governed by none of those distinctions in society that are so wont to obtain. He is equally the honored guest of education, opulence, and power; though yesterday, like Doctor Clarke, he dined on potatoes in a mud hut with one of his delighted parishioners. Here is he furnished with a peculiar and unconfined power of usefulness.

Nor do we mean, by pastoral visiting, those hasty professional calls made by some, and which pass under that name. We have known some preachers whose object seemed to be to see how many families they could call upon in the shortest given time possible. One young brother

undue haste in the

boasted to us once that he had made ten pas toral visits in an hour, and prayed in every house. We have no confidence in such a course. Such visits are mere official and dead, wanting in the living freshness of a sympathetic heart, and can do but little good. Nothing is more inappropriate or rude than an discharge of so holy a duty. But it may be objected that great haste is necessary, or but few families can be visited. The answer to this objection is, attach the importance to the work which it demands, commence in time. Visit a few families daily, and you will soon have the privilege of saying of your flock, "My sheep know my voice."

Most especially should the pastor avail him self of special occasions to be present in the fam ilies of his parishioners. Has some misfortune befallen one of them? Let him be the first to tender condolence and sympathy, and suitable lessons of submission. Sickness, it may be, with her wan countenance, her sunken, sallow eye, her skeleton frame, her nights of restlessness and painful vigils, her bitter herbs and pungent agonies, may have become the dread inmate of a family. Its head, perhaps, may be slowly sinking into the grave, or some favorite son, to

whom health seemed almost guaranteed, may have been suddenly smitten down by a dire ailment; or a lovely daughter, the pride and hope of the family, may have become a victim of that slow, but certain slaughterer of worth and beauty, the consumption. Here is a household of heavy hearts, a house whose rooms are dark at noon, and, over whose threshold the foot learns to fall with lightened tread. Here a fond mother strives to suppress her grief by the side of pain and pining love, but hastens away to her closet to weep and to pray. Now right here it is that the preacher should hear the voice once spoken to the Saviour, "Behold, he whom thou lovest is sick." And, like that precious Saviour, he should hasten in due time to mingle the tears of his sympathy with grief and bereavement. It was over a scene of sickness and death that it is recorded of Jesus, "He wept." Good seed may be sown here with a most sanguine hope of a fruitful harvest. There is nothing like the loss of health to make one feel the worthlessness of the world. Men will look up when drowning. There is no cordial to the sick like that of the frequent attention of a beloved friend. In this dark day his heart is to be won, and the preacher who cares both for my soul and body, who,

Christ-like, is touched with the feelings of my infirmities, will exert over me an omnipotent power. How easily and appropriately, too, can that pastor, when acquainted with the wants of that sick family, bring their cases before God in his prayers in the pulpit, and thus bend the whole social heavens of the neighborhood in sympathy over them. What effect will such attentions have upon a wayward son of that family? Long will the remembrance of it linger like the fragrance of grace in the memories of the survivors of that family after the pastor is gone. If visiting the sick is written by inspiration as a fruit of pure and undefiled religion on the part of Christians in common, what is to be thought of the pastor who would not make a special exertion to pray by the bedside of the sick, and to be ranked among the most active sympathizers? It may sometimes happen that bread literally, as well as bread spiritually, is needed at the house of the sick. Few can make these delicate discoveries better than the faithful pastor; and if it be not in his immediate power to supply the want, he possesses special ability to influence the action of others. It is scarcely less necessary at times to win souls to Christ by loaves and fishes than by expostulations and pray