PREFATORY NOTE. HILE the title of this volume expresses with perhaps sufficient clearness the object which the Author had in view in preparing it, yet it may be desirable to explain that it is specially designed for the young, and more particularly for that important and interesting class of them who form the rising hope of the country and of the Church-viz., our Young Men. The subjects treated of were employed by the Author in a winter course of instruction to the young men of his own congregation; and the interest awakened in them encouraged the hope that they might prove useful in a wider sphere. Accordingly the substance of them appeared in a series of articles which were published in that excellent periodical The Christian Treasury; and at the suggestion of several brethren, they are now presented to the public in this more permanent form, the preparation of which has been a source of great pleasure to the Author during a period of rest and relaxation from active duty. And though the volume makes no pretensions to originality, yet he trusts that if accompanied by the needed blessing, it may not be uninteresting or unprofitable to those for whom it is specially designed. It may also be stated that the leading thought |