INTEMPERANCE.

I ventured to tell a man a few months since, who had just fallen into habits of intemperance, that if he did not reform forthwith, he would speedily ruin himself, soul and body, but he did not believe it, yet he is dead of drink already.

The evil and painful effects of intemperance, do not constitute the penalty of the law against that sin. "The soul that sinneth, it shall die," points to the penalty.

EVIL SPEAKING.

Perhaps no single cause contributes more to banish the Spirit of God from the houses and hearts of men than evil speaking. There are sins of more flagrant enormity, but what sin is more extensively diffused? Evil speaking! Who is without sin in this respect? How common it has become. How much of it there is every day—every where-in the city and in the country at home and abroad-in every large concourse—and in every little company, and even in the soliloquy of the closet. Who is not among its actors

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and its objects? We sacrifice others on this cruel altar, and then we ourselves become its cruel victims. How easily we slide into this sin.

APPLAUSE.

The tooth of slander conceals a virulence that may poison a reputation which a whole life has been spent in earning. The applause of the world! A breath expires it; and how often does the returning inspiration reclaim it.

NOVEL READING AND THEATRES.

I cannot conceive that man, whose twofold business it is to earn his bread by the sweat of his brow, and to work out his salvation with fear and trembling, ought to have much to do with those tales of chivalrous adventure, moving incident, and high wrought fanciful love, which so much abound. The didactic, rather Though your than the romantic, befits human life. pleasure be connected with light and airy fancy, your interest lies in heavy facts.

How often are persons heard to say of certain amusements or employments of questionable propriety, that they are sure they receive no injury from them, however it may be with others. But how came they to the knowledge of this fact? And why do they speak so positively? They may not be conscious of the injury, and yet it may be received. True, the amusement or employment in question, may not maim any member of the body-may not infuriate any passion of the heart; but how can they say that it does not exert any evil influence on the easily susceptible and finely fibred soul? This is not a matter to be decided by feeling. Take for illustration, the habit of attending upon theatrical amusements, or the practice of romance and novel reading. Many contend that both of these are harmless. Without attempting now to prove their hurtfulness, (though I firmly believe it) it may be confidently asserted, that their hurtfulness or innocence cannot be determined by the feelings of persons, while thus employed. The question can only be determined by inquiring into the nature and tendencies of these things, and by carefully investigating the character formed under such influences. If the scenes presented and sentiments expressed at a theatre, or in an amatory novel, can be proved to have a tendency to injure the soul, (and what is more susceptible of injury?) it is absurd to say that they do not injure any particular individual. They do; but here is the secret of the matter. They injure in a way which the individual not only is not conscious of, but cares nothing about. For example, they kill the spirit of devotion, estrange

the soul from God, neutralize and secularize the mind, not affecting, perhaps, the morals of the life, but corrupting the morals of the heart, and hardening it, not to every kind of impression, but to the peculiar impressions of religion. For the heart may be all alive to some kinds of good feeling, such as friendships and pity, while it is as dead as death itself to other kinds of praiseworthy emotion, such as the love of God and of Jesus Christ. Now what do the great multitude care for such effects as these, even should they admit them to be produced? Nothing. Therefore they resort to the theatre and devour romances.

PERVERSIONS.

How many are guilty of the folly of regarding privileges as pledges-present favors as earnests of future blessedness. They suppose that there is no danger of God's changing his method of dealing with them—that being so indulgent to them now, he will never cease to be so. They forget the difference between probation and retribution. They forget that "there are first, that shall be last," and that some "who are exalted to honor, shall be cast down to hell."

You cannot scourge yourself into the favor of God, nor emaciate yourself into acceptance with him.

Men are often willing to do towards securing salvation, more than is required of them, if they but be permitted to do it according to their own mind and in their own manner. They are agreed to strive to enter in at the strait gate, if they may do it in their own way. It is not to the amount, but to the nature of the requisitions of the Gospel, that they are averse. They are ready to make sacrifices of property and personal comfort, to almost any extent, if these things may but be the price of their redemption.

SELF-DECEPTION.

It is a melancholy and mortifying fact, that men, not only may be and often are deceived, but may and often do, deceive themselves. The cheat and dupe is frequently the same identical individual. And greater is the danger of self-deception, than of deception from any other source. The world is deceitful-riches are deceitful-the devil is deceitful, but the heart is decitful above all things. We are liable to be imposed on by other intelligent beings. We are still more exposed to imposition from ourselves.

How many hopes are built on the wreck of the Bible. Strange that any should content themselves with the mere profession and form of Christianity, when so large