bitter waters of strife are let forth; but their course cannot be foreseen; and he seldom fails of suffering most from eir poisonous effect, who first allowed them to flow.

SECTION V.

BLAIR

A SUSPICIOUS TEMPER A SOURCE OF MISERY TO ITS

POSSESSOR,

As a suspicious spirit is a source of many crimes and calamities in the world, so it is the spring of certain misery to the person who indulges it. His friends will be few; and small will be his comfort in those whom he possesses. Believing others to be his enemies, he will of course make them such. Let his caution be ever so great, the asperity of his thoughts will often break out in his behavior; and in return for suspecting and hating, he will incur suspicion and hatred. Besides the external evils which he draws upon himself, arising from alienated friendship, broken confidence, and open enmity, the suspicious temper itself is one of the worst evils which any man can suffer. If" in all fear there is torment," how miserable must be his state, who by living in perpetual jealousy, lives in perpetual dread! Looking up

himself to be surrounded with spies, enemies, and design ing men, he is a stranger to reliance and trust. He knows not to whom to open himself. He dresses his countenance in forced smiles while his heart throbs within, from appre hension of secret treachery. Hence fretfulness and ill hu❤ mor, disgust at the world, and all the painful sensations of an irritated and embittered mind:

So numerous and great are the evils arising from a suspi sious disposition, that, of the two extremes, it is more eligi ble to expose ourselves to occasional disadvantages from thinking too well of others, than to suffer continual misery by thinking always ill of them. It is better to be sometimes imposed upon than never to trust. Safety is purchased at too dear a rate, when in order to secure it, we are obliged to be always clad in armour, and to live in perpetual hostility with our fellows. This is, for the sake of living, to deprive ourselves of the comfort of life. The man of can dor enjoys his situation. whatever it is, with cheerfulness and cace. Prudence directs his intercourse with the world

but no black suspicion haunts his hours of rest.

Accustom

ed to view the characters of his neighbors in the most favorable light, he is like one who dwells amidst those beautiful scenes of nature, on which the eye rests with pleasureWhereas the suspicious man, having his imagination filled with all the shocking forms of human talsehood, deceit and treacht ry, resen bles the traveller in the wilderness, who disceris no objects around him but such as are either dreary or terrible; caverns that open, serpents that hiss, and beasts of prey that howl.

SECTION VI.

COMFORTS OF RELIGION.

BLAIR,

THERE are many who have passed the age of youth and beauty; who have resigned the pleasures of that smiling season; who begin to decline into the vale of years, impaired in their health, depressed in their fortunes, stript of their friends, their children, and perhaps still more tender convexious; what resource can this world afford them? It presents a dark and dreary waste, through which there does not issue a single ray of comfort. Every delusive prospect of ambition is now at an end; long experience of mankind, an expcrience very different from what the open and generous s of youth had fondly dreamt of, has rendered the heart almost inaccessible to new friendships. The principal sources of activity are taken away, when those for whom w、 labor are cut off from us: these who animated, and those who sweetened all the toils of life. Where then can the soul fiud refuge, but in the bosom of religion? 4 bere she is admitted to those prospects of providence and futurity, which alone can warm and fill the heart. I speak here of such as retain the feelings of humanity; whom misfortunes have softened, and perhaps rendered more delicately sensible; not of such as possess that stupid insensibility, which some are pleased to dignify with the name of philosophy.

It might therefore be expected, that these philosophers, who think they stand in no nced themselves of the assistance of religion to support their virtue, and who never feel the want of its consolations, would yet have the humanity to consider the very different situation of the rest of mankind; and not endeavor to deprive them of what habit, at

But

their continuance on earth, they highly prize it and with the greatest anxiety seek to lengthen it out. But when they view it in separate parcels, they appear to hold it in contempt and squander it with inconsiderate profusion. While they complain that life is short, they are often wishing ts different periods at an end. Covetous of every other possession, of time only they are prodigal. They allow every idle man to be master of this property, and make every friv ok us occupation welcome that can help them to consume it. Among those who are so careless of time, it is not to be expected that order should be observed in its distribution. by this fatal neglect, how many materials of severe and lastin regret are they laying up in store for themselves! The time which they suffer to pass away in the midst of confusion, bitter repentance seeks afterwards in vain to recal. was omitted to be done at its proper moment, arises to the torment of some future season. Manhood is "disgraced by the consequences of neglec ed youth. Old age, oppressed by cares that belonged to a former period, labors under a burthen not its own. At the close of life, the dying man beholds with anguish that his days are finishing, when his preparation for eternity is hardly commuced. Such are the ef fects of a disorderly waste of ume, through not attending to its value. Every thing in the life of such persons is mispla ced. Nothing is performed aright, from not being performed in due season.

What

But he who is orderly in the distribution of his time, takes the proper method of escaping those manifold evils. He is justly said to redeem the time. By proper management, he prolongs it. Se iives much in little space; more in a few years than others do in many. He can live to God and his own soul, and at the same time attend to all the law

ful interests of the present world. He looks back on the past and provides for the future. He catches and ariests the hours as they fly. They are marked down for useful puposes, and their memory remains. Whereas those hours fleet by the man of confusion like a shadow. His days and years are either blanks of which he has no remembrance, or they are filled up with such a confused and irregular succession of unfinished transactions, that though he remembers he has been busy yet he can give no account of the business which has employed him.

BLAIR.

SECTION IX.

AHE DIGNITY OF VIRTUE AMIDST CORRUPT EXAMPLES.

THE most excellent and honorable character which can adorn a man and a christian, is acquired by resisting the torvent of vice, and adhering to the cause of God and virtue against a corrupted multitude. It will be found to hold in general, that all those, who, in any of the great lines of life, have distinguished themselves for thinking profoundly, and acting nobly, have despised popular prejudices, and depart -ed, in several things, from the common ways of the world. On no occasion is this more requisite for true honor, than where religion and morality are concerned. In times of prevailing licentiousness, to maintain unblemished virtue, and uncorrupted integrity; in a pu lic or priva'e cause, to stand firm by what is fair and just, amidst 'd sourage. ments and opposition; despising groundless censure and reproach; disdaining all compliance with public manners, when they are vicious and unlawful; and never ashamed of the punctual discharge of every duty towards Ged and man; this is what shows true greatness of spirit, and will fore approbation even from the degenerate multitude themselves. "This is the man" (their conscience will oblige them to seknowledge,) "whom we are unable to bend to mean conde

scensions. We see it is in vain either to flatter or to threa ten him; he rests on a principle within, which we cancot shake. To this ma we may, on any occasion safely cummit our cause. He is incapable of betraying his trust, oz deserting his friend, or deny ing his faith."

It is, accordingly, this steady inflexible virtue, this regard to principle, superior to all custom and opinion, which peculiarly marked the characters of the in any

age, wito have shone with distinguished lustre; and has cors erat d their memory to all posterity. It was this th. tobran to ancient Enoch the most singular testimony of horer from heaven. He continued, to walk with God," when the world apostatised from him. He pleased God, and was beloved of him; so that living among simmers, he was translated to heaven without seeing death; Yea, speedily was he token away lest wickedness should have altered his urkerstanding, or deceit beguiled his soul." When Sodom could

G

But

not furnish ten righteous men to save it, Lot remained un spotted amidst the contagion. He lived like an angel among spirits of darkness; and the destroying flame was not permitted to go forth, till the good man was called away by a heavenly messenger from his devoted city. When all flesh had corrupted their way upon the earth," then lived Noah, a righteous man, and a preacher of righteousness.He stood alone, and was scoffed by the profane crew. they by the deluge were swept away; while on him Providence conferred the immortal honor, of being the restorer of a better race, and the father of a new world. Such examples as these, and such honors conferred by God on them who withstood the multitude of evil doers, should often be present to our minds. Let us oppose them to the numbers of low and corrupt examples which we behold around us; and when we are in hazard of being swayed by such, let us fortify our virtue, by thinking of those who in former times, shone like stars in the midst of surrounding darkness, and are now shining in the kingdom of heaven, as the brightness of the firmament for ever and ever.

SECTION X.

PLAIR.

THE MORTIFICATIONS OF VICE GREATER THAN THOSE OF VIRTUE.

THOUGH no condition of human life is free from uneasiness, yet it must be allowed, that the uneasiness belonging to a sinful course, is far greater than what attends a course of well doing. If we are weary of the labors of virtuc, we may be assured, that the world, whenever we try the exchange, will lay a much heavier load. It is the outside, only, of a licentious life which is gay and smiling. Within it conceals toil and trouble and deadly sorrow. For vice poisons human happiness in the spring, by introducing disorder into the heart. Those passions which it seems to indulge, it only feeds with imperfect gratifications; and thereby strengthers them for preying, in the end, on their unhap py victims.

It is a great mistake to imagine, that the pain of self-denial is confined to virtue. He who follows the world, as much as he who follows Christ, must take up his cross: and him assuredly, it will prove a more oppressive burden.-.