santly heightening significance to the seed God himself planted in the human soul.

To this lengthened discussion must be added, in closing, some distinct consideration of the practical influence of the doctrine I have maintained. Individual opinions respecting human nature have, in the same general class of believers, now reached to so wide a difference, that one, belonging to no theological sect or denomination, may express his judgment on this subject wholly apart from any theological odium or envy. The conviction of sin is thought by many to be the grand basis of all spiritual edification. That it is a necessary element in the foundation of character, one pillar, if not the corner-stone, of the building, cannot be fairly denied. But this solid support is to be found in a conviction of actual, not of a fancied natural, sin; while a conviction, not only of the sin in our heart, but of the goodness, too, which there solicits us, is requisite to any lofty endeavor or achievement. The moral evil of our own soul, as well as the injurious evil inflicted by our fellow-men, we can overcome only with good. Jesus said to his disciples, that the spirit he should send would "reprove, or convict, the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment." Wonderful instance of his penetrating wisdom, of his divine inspiration, that he would have men convicted, not only of wrong-doing, but of holiness too! It is not sufficient for God's purpose respecting us, that we should be repelled from iniquity, but that we should moreover be kindled with the generous flame of

excellence, being baptized "with the Holy Ghost and with fire.” While we come to spurn at vice, to take the distance of disgust and be removed from it by the power of repentance, something lofty and magnanimous, positively pure and worthy, must as it were descend from heaven to lay hold of, inspire, and lift us. As the lives of the bad do not so greatly bless us as the examples of the good, so dwelling even upon our own faults and mistakes is not so profitable, as to contemplate and become vitally possessed with wisdom and virtue. If only the "unclean" demon is expelled, "seven other more wicked spirits" will take up their abode in the empty house whence he is gone out. But give occupation and lodgment in the breast to the Holy Spirit, and, though the evil temper have been as a strong man armed, a stronger than he shall take from him "all his armor," and "keep his palace."

Reason and God's word, Christ's method and our own heart, together attest the superior power of goodness to win, over that of vice to warn us. The little child gets a better benediction from the biography of the good, than from the histories of transgression and all the diaries and morbid exposures of impurity and deceit. The experienced teacher of the young, with the practised reformer of the erring and prodigal, bears witness that touching the better feelings of the heart is more effectual, to guide or reclaim, than pointing to the precipice of ruin, or pouring out the vials of wrath. Demand what is noble and good; draw the line of high expectation; in your whole tone

and deportment presume and require your fellowcreatures to walk upon it; cast out into practical scorn, absurdity, and impossibility, the base and unmanly part; put it into the region of your own ignorance, let it be to you only a shock and surprise as coming from them; and they will be apt to make an effort to come up to the mark and place of your standard. A moral magnetism will draw them into blessed captivity; as Christ's own life attracts us into the imitation of his spirit, and obedience of his law. The language, "England expects," could nerve with double force every heart that throbbed to the sound. A writer of fiction well describes a poor, degraded creature who had led his life in the vilest parts of the social walk, as being stirred even to inward renewal by the words addressed to him, Heart and honor! Animals themselves seem to feel something like a moral impression from man's treatment of them. If he gives them a bad name with a curse and a blow, even they are degraded. They know when their race is persecuted, and are thus made mean and vindictive. A higher, and, we are almost tempted to think, more than mortal nature is brought out in them by kindness, confidence, fellowship, and sympathy. Before the at once commanding and confiding eye of their keeper, the fierceness even of the lion, leopard, and tiger sinks and ebbs away into the low and remote channels of their bosom, and the awkward but affecting tokens of intelligence and good-will come out in their grotesque motions, and gleam upon their harsh or rug

ged features. And it is wonderful that human nature, considering how it has been denominated and treated in time past, can bear so clear indications, as we may distinguish in it, of goodness and hope. But a wiser and better day is dawning, when the sins into whose commission it is tempted will not be regarded with any less serious disapproval, yet with a more considerate and profounder judgment; while its frame from an Almighty hand for a glorious virtue will be discerned and acknowledged, exercised and vindicated. May God hasten that day; for it is the day of the coming of his own kingdom of light and holiness and love!

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DISCOURSE XXIII.

HUMAN NEED.

Rev. iii. 17. -BECAUSE THOU SAVEST, I AM RICH, AND INCREASED WITH GOODS, AND HAVE NEED OF NOTHING; AND KNOWEST NOT THAT THOU ART WRETCHED AND MISERABLE AND POOR AND BLIND AND NAKED.

Ir is commonly supposed to be the apostle John who thus addresses a church of Christ, outwardly prosperous and flourishing, but spiritually poor and destitute. Whether this outward prosperity consisted in numbers and handsome ecclesiastical appointments, or in worldly riches and grandeur, or, as is very likely, in the union of a rich estate with a pompous ritual, does not certainly appear. It is only manifest, that, under some sort of splendid external show and conceited self-satisfaction, - the Laodicean church being, as we learn from history, the wealthy metropolitan church of the neighborhood,

the real life of religion was faltering and dying out. And so the apostle represents their condition as one of need and poverty, though they themselves felt they had need of nothing. He would make them sensible of their need, that they might seek for it a supply. It is no slight attainment for us all to become thus sensible, and thus to seek. Prosperous