to you on a sudden demand, or allow their hearts to be carried as by storm. It is by many particular acts and unfailing tokens of regard that you will succeed it is by the contribution of mites.

Would you secure a fair reputation? The wise and good, whose esteem alone is precious, will not judge of you by the few shining deeds of philanthropy and honesty which you put boldly forth for the inspection of the world, but by your constant habits in business, your daily walk, your most private treatment of the humblest man in your service, in short, by your contribution of mites to individual happiness and the public good.

Above all, would you be truly religious, and secure the favor of an almighty Friend? His eye resteth ever on the soul; and, to its infallible vision, great deeds dwindle, or small ones are exalted, according to the temper from which they flow. Splendid pretences of generosity appear in all their hollowness, and true habitual kindness alone is accepted. Forms and flatteries, sacrifices and prostrations, are all vain without a constant piety. Selfish thanks for sudden prosperity, and selfish cries for help in sudden danger, mount not to his throne like the grateful incense of "prayer without ceasing."

Wait not, then, for extraordinary occasions. The present moment, and the mite you can contribute as it passes, are your all. For, rightly viewed, whát is the present moment but the index on the dial-plate, for ever moving till it makes up your whole life? And what is the mite you now contribute but that

exertion of your whole strength to meet the present demand, without which, in the longest life, nothing is accomplished? The whole of religion, then, is comprised in one simple direction: Do all you can from a pure motive now. Thus, small as your actions may appear to men, like the widow's mites they will be great in the eye of Heaven; and though they attract not the admiration of the world, they will secure your eternal peace.

DISCOURSE V.

FORBEARANCE.

Col. iii. 13. -FORBEARING ONE ANOTHER.

So writes Paul to the Ephesians also. It is an exhortation very simple, yet important. You whose lot unites you in the same local habitation and name, you who are leagued in friendship or business, in the changes of sympathy and the chances of collision, "forbear one another." The matter is too plain for explanation, and yet the joy and woe of human life hang upon it. What is the great evil in our lot of mortality? Is it sickness, death, sorrow? No: it is misunderstanding, disagreement, alienation, — the passions of men, a thousand-fold more afflictive than the ordinations of God. In our providential griefs, fountains of tears refresh us; sweet memories consolę, and mysterious hopes beckon; but what consolation for our distrust and scorn and altercation?

Such a confession may not be made aloud. Aloud we may lament only the outward distresses. As men hide the infirmities and diseases of the body, so we cloak and bandage over the heart the real troubles, deeper than all the ills that "flesh is heir to." How shall we cure these? A sure remedy is named in the

text, "forbearing one another." And what is it to forbear? It is to endure injury meekly, for the injurious person's sake, when in a rigid account we might seem justified in resistance or complaint. And to be unforbearing is to fire at insult, burning to be proudly even with the insulter, like the literal Jew, saying, "An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth." Forbearance is yielding something we might claim, pardoning when we might punish, sacrificing a legal or customary right to a moral affection, foregoing a desire we might urge from a willingness, like our Master's, not to please ourselves. In the domestic circle, to forbear is to curb our imperiousness, repress impatience, pause in the burst of another's feeling, and from our bosom pour oil on the billows, instead of adding to the swelling tide.

Now, I am aware this is a virtue few appreciate. It seems no great and splendid thing, in some daily issue of feeling or opinion, to withhold a little, to tighten the rein upon headlong propensity, and await a calm for fair adjustment. It is a very unambitious, undisplaying virtue, not so likely to be marked and praised as smartness and spirit, and readiness for an encounter. Its symptoms are not to most persons striking; being a quiet attitude and lips, that, like Christ's when he was accused, answer nothing. And this, the undiscerning may mistake for dulness, or want of becoming chivalry. But to the all-seeing God there is a beauty in such repose, beyond the exploits of strength and bravery. In the finest statues of ancient art, the last perfection is a calmness of posture, seeming to embosom unbounded power.

This virtue of forbearance, from Gospel to Epistle, runs along the whole foundation of Christianity. Indeed I must consider it a mark of Christ's divinity, that he should make a self-restraining meekness so crowning a virtue of his religion, in an age which had little to remember but universal violence and bloodshed. The whole idea of virtue under the Roman sway was active courage. Nay, the very name virtue meant martial valor, the strength of the sword-arm, and the achievements of battle. It was speaking against the customs of ages, alike the passions of barbarians and the virtues of civilization, when Christ said, "Resist not evil: when one cheek is smitten, turn the other." Men had not thought that it required more power to let go the sword than to wield it, to drop the hand than to clench it. Nor have many of us even yet entered into the full sublimity of his words to Peter, after he had smitten the high priest's servant, "Put up thy sword into the sheath."

Not that Christ would replace the Roman valor with a weak pusillanimity. Forbearance is not cowardice or want of feeling, pale apprehension trembling in the breast; but, when the blood of passion redly mounts, it is that victory over one's self grander than over a city; and, so viewed, I maintain it to be a trait of perpetual and vast consequence. Made universal, it would strike off half the catalogue of human woes. Do you ask me where are the most discouraging triumphs of sin? I will not point you to a few battle-fields, smoke-wreathed and reek