terials supplied by the transactions and events of the world, and an intense enjoyment of the power of imagination urges him to produce them in various kinds and degrees. From his birth, when by nature he is made to depend for existence upon the affection of others, to his day of death, when their presence sooths his departure, he is framed to love his kind and kindred, and if he have nothing among them to love, is unhappy for the want of it; he feels that his nature lacks a natural enjoyment which would increase its felicity.

Such is man: his happiness is various, and drawn from many sources; nor can one be closed without diminishing it. But can the heaven of a being like this consist in prayer and contemplation? Can ît consist in mere tranquillity and ease; in admiration of works which it has till now been his joy to inquire into, or indifferent communion with others, though they be angels? What is that space during which he is to dwell in heaven? Eternity-not ages, not the lifetime of material worlds; but uncreated, imperishable eternity. Something must be done in eternity, or active man would be miserable. If he had been formed only contemplative and adoring, if ease had satisfied his capacities of enjoyment, and safety his desires, then indeed he would have found his heaven in the perfection of these objects. But God made him differently.

He who fashioned his capacities did so upon another scale, and this inactive one therefore cannot satisfy him. His Creator also has promised him in future a happiness beyond anything he has ever felt here. That' may consist in the enlargement of his faculties, but certainly it cannot in their restriction. Virtue that is more perfect, the bounds of knowledge enlarged and enlarging, freer and wider scope of action, and more faithful and congenial attachments; these things sound more like the place which men would call heaven, and, if possessed, would allow him to look beyond for those enjoyments of which he has yet no idea. But if he feel that these would be pleasure, what would he do without them? They are his happiness, and God has promised him happiness in heaven.I may be answered, that the change between life and death, the change which is effected in death, is always looked upon as something mysterious and extreme; and that our capacities of happiness may be altered so as to desire something different from that which satisfies them here.I may be reminded that evil and turbulent passions will cease, and repose and reflection therefore become sources of more enjoyment than is possible in this world; that the activity of mankind is chiefly employed upon pursuits which arise out of the wants or errors of a mortal and corrupted state, and which therefore it is absurd to suppose should continue

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The answer I would return to this, refers me to the second relative circumstance I have mentioned, namely, that this world is a place of preparation for the next. An event or a state of existence is not prepared for by passing through circumstances entirely distinct from it. Preparation may be made in spite of those circumstances; but unless themselves or the effect they produce is congenial, they will not forward it. Now if the dispositions, en joyments, and occupations which this world not only induces but necessitates, be quite distinct from those of the future, they are opstaan 916means, to preparation. But we are told this is the probationary place wherein we are to become fit heaven. Here we are to form our tempers, and acquire our inclinations for eternity-there they are fixed; here they are still optional. And what what is it that will are we to work upon; 1 never die, though the material objects which occupy that immortal part, perish after a few more years?—is it not our intellect, is it not our affections? They are the attributes of the soul and parts of its nature, every one of which proceeds from the creating hand; and though humanity be corrupted and fallen, it is still the same nature as on that day w when man came

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forth dignified and virtuous into the world, which was then his paradise. Supposing all future existence to consist in employments which excluded the powers and feelings that here expand in active and social life, it would surely have been a better preparation for it to have placed us in a world where they did not exist―to have given us a nature which did not require them.

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That part of our nature which they constitute must be annihilated when the good man dies, if he is to be placed in such a heaven; and then what was its use? to carry on the business of a world existing for only 7 or 8,000 years in the midst of eternity? A business which in such case would refer to nothing but its own brief existence, and yet occupy more than half the time of beings to whom but three score and ten years are given to make themselves fit for immortality. These are not only useless, they are hurtful. Yet no; God's creation cannot be thus-I would far rather believe that no natural power exists here, which shall not have an equal duration with the spirit, and that the employments and pleasures which arise from the lawful use of them will be found again in kind, in the future, though the degree may be infinitely modified, and thus their existence here be a part of the plan for eternity which it is so probable our Maker should have formed.

It is easy to understand the difference between these powers, which I conclude are immortal, and those which relate to the mere preservation of that animal frame in which we are informed that we are enclosed for a short time only. That circumstance points out at once the value to be placed upon them; they are worthy only of such estimation as belongs to things intended for the service of a few years, and the means of gratifying which will soon be removed. With the removal of the frame to which they belong they will cease to be capacities of our nature, and any inclinations contracted mentally towards them would cause unhappiness, because incapable of gratification. But although we shall not always have mortal bodies, no portion of our spirits ever shall decay; provisions which relate to the perishable organs will at that future time belong to a state of existence lower than that which we have attained, and are therefore to be little regarded; but those powers which belong to the imperishable parts of our nature, and are capable of developments to which we can see no more termination than to their existence, have a right to our attention in proportion to their durability. The first are necessary for the early steps in the rank of being which man makes. They compose that condition in which his faculties begin their development; as the narrow bonds of the cocoon compose that enclosure which is essential to