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attainment of his object. "All these things have I kept from my youth up; what lack I yet? Jesus said unto him. If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven, and come and follow me." Notwithstanding all your professions," (as if the Saviour had said,) “you love yourself better than you love your neighbour. Prove the contrary, if you can. Get rid of your cherished wealth; commit yourself to the providence of God; become my disciple; I will show you the way to heaven, and assure you of the possession of its joys.' The result proved that the Lord had a perfect knowledge of the case. "When the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions." He was not willing to carry out his avowed principles by making the sacrifice required of him. He had neither faith in God, nor love to man. Had he complied with the directions of Christ, his tone would have been soon altered. Taught the spirituality of the Divine law, and convinced of the sinfulness of his best deeds, he would have gladly embraced the hope of the gospel, rejoicing in Christ Jesus, and having no confidence in the flesh, Phil. iii. 3. Then, living by 'faith, and vitally united to the Saviour, his obedience would have been evangelical; his works would have been "good works;" while, deeply sensible of the imperfection and sinfulness still cleaving to every human action, and that "there is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not," Eccles. vii. 20, he would have lived and died, "looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life," Jude 21.

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE FORM AND THE POWER OF GODLINESS.

1. THE form of godliness is common; but the power

is rare.

of it

2. The form of godliness is cheap; but the power of it is

dear.

3. The form of godliness is easy; but the power of it is

difficult.

4. The form of godliness is a credit; but the power of it is a reproach.

5. The form of godliness is pleasing; but its displeasing to the ignoble part of a Christian.

power

is

6. The form of godliness may exist with secret and with open wickedness; but the power of godliness cannot, it lays the axe to the very root of all sin both secret and open.

Brooks.

OCCASIONAL MEDITATIONS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS. UPON THE SIGHT OF A BLACKAMOOR.

Lo, there is a man whose hue shows him to be far from home, his very skin betrays his climate; it is night in his face, while it is day in ours. What a difference there is in men, both in their fashion and colour; and yet all children of one Father! Neither is there less variety in their insides; their dispositions, judgments, opinions, differ as much as their shapes and complexions; that which is beauty to one, is deformity to another. We should be looked upon in this man's country with no less wonder and strange coyness than he is here; our whiteness would pass there for an unpleasing indigestion of form. Outward beauty is more in the eye of the beholder than in the face that is seen; in every colour, that is fair which pleaseth. The very spouse of Christ can say, I am black, but comely; this is our colour spiritually, yet the eye of our gracious God and Saviour can see that beauty in us wherewith he is delighted. The true Moses marries a blackamoor, Christ his Church. It is not for us to regard the skin, but the soul: if that be innocent, pure, holy, the blots of an outside TRACT MAG., THIRD SERIES, NO. 105, SEPT., 1842. K

cannot set us off from the love of Him who hath said, Behold, thou art fair, my sister, my spouse; if that be foul and black, it is not in the power of an angelical brightness of our hide to make us other than a loathsome eye-sore to the Almighty. O God, make my inside lovely to thee; I know that beauty will hold; whilst weather, casualty, age, disease may deform the outer man, and mar both colour and features.

UPON THE SIGHT OF A COFFIN STUCK WITH FLOWERS.

Too fair appearance is never free from just suspicion; whilst here was nothing but mere wood, no flower was to be seen here; now that this wood is lined with an unsavory corpse, it is adorned with this sweet variety. The fir whereof that coffin is made yields a natural redolence alone; now that it is stuffed thus noisomely all helps are too little to countervail that scent of corruption: neither is it otherwise in the living.

Perpetual use of strong perfumes argues a guiltiness of some unpleasing savour. The case is the same spiritually; an over-glorious outside of profession implies some inward filthiness that would fain escape notice. Our uncomely parts have more comeliness put on; too much ornament imports extreme deformity: for me, let my show be moderate, so shall I neither deceive applause nor merit too deep censure.

GOOD Lord, how witty men are to kill one another! What fine devices they have found out to murder afar off; to slay many at once, and so to fetch off lives; that whilst a whole lane is made of carcasses with one blow, nobody knows who hurt him. And what honour do we place in slaughter! Those arms, wherein we pride ourselves, are such as which we, or our ancestors, have purchased with blood. The monuments of our glory are the spoils of a subdued and slain enemy; where, contrarily, all the titles of God sound of mercy and gracious respects to man. God the Father is the Maker and Preserver of men; God the Son is the Saviour of mankind; God the Holy Ghost styles himself the Comforter. Alas, whose image do we bear in

The firing of a cannon.

this disposition but his whose true title is the destroyer? It is easy to take away the life; it is not easy to give it. Give me the man that can devise how to save troops of men from killing, his name shall have room in my calendar. There is more true honour in a civic garland for the preserving of one subject than in a laurel for the victory of many enemies. O God, there are enough that bend their thoughts to undo what thou hast made, enable thou me to bestow my endeavours in repriving or rescuing that which might otherwise perish. O thou, who art our common Saviour, make thou me both ambitious and able to help to save some other besides myself.

Bp. Hall.

"THE DAY WILL BREAK BY-AND-BY." It was about four o'clock in the morning that I quitted the farm-house, where for a week I had passed my time in peace and repose. Old Roger, a servant on the farm, carried my portmanteau over his shoulder, for we had a walk before us of four or five miles to meet the coach. "How dark it is!" said I, looking up at the starless and gloomy sky. "Yes, sir, it is dark enough of a certain," said Roger, as he led the way cautiously across a hollow way, through the fern and furze, and thorns and brambles; but the day will break by-and-by."

There was something so cheering and encouraging in the way in which the old man spoke this, as well as in the words themselves, that it gathered like a cordial round my heart. True, I did now and then stumble, and at times a furze bush or a straggling bramble for a moment entangled my feet, but this mattered not. "The day will break by-and-by," thought I, still musing on old Roger's words, "and then we shall get on better."

On went the old man with his burden, and close at his heels I followed; and whether it was that coming from the bright fireside in the farm-house, the night had at first appeared darker than it really was, or whether my sight, by degrees becoming more accustomed to the gloom, discerned, on that account, the objects around me clearer than before, certain it is, that ere we had walked a mile, I could distinguish my path, and the trees and the brambles about it, with very little difficulty.

There were so many uncouth stiles and high gates to

clamber over, that we proceeded rather slowly, but every mile we walked there was a lessening of the gloom: twilight turned into grey, and grey into a clear light. The east having by little and little grown brighter, began to glow with yellow and red; and long before we had arrived at the place where the coach changed horses, the birds were warbling around us, the sun over the distant hills was blazing in the sky, and the heavens were glowing with purple and gold.

Many a year has rolled away since then, and old Roger has been, long since, " gathered to his fathers," in the village churchyard. The farm-house itself has been made into a modern-looking mansion, and is inhabited by a new tenant. The little road-side public-house, where the coach used to change horses, has been taken down, and a railroad station is erected near the spot. These, with other changes, have taken place, and many who then lived in the neighbourhood have been called to another world; yet here am I still, calling back to my memory the walk which I had with old Roger, and his encouraging expression, "The day will break by-and-by."

In that walk, as I said, the sky was gloomy, and brambles straggled across my path; but since then I have passed through darker seasons, and along pathways more rugged and briery. Troubles have awaited me, not more than were necessary for my good, nor heavier than God has given me strength to bear, but still they were troubles, and had I not been taught by a heavenly Instructor, that "affliction cometh not forth of the dust, neither doth trouble spring out of the ground," Job v. 6, how could I have sustained them? In the darkest seasons, however, I have been led to look upwards, even to the hills, "from whence cometh my help," and have been mercifully enabled to say, "The day will break by-and-by!"

And how, reader, has it been with you? Have you peacefully walked in " green pastures,' " and "beside the still waters;" or has a rude, a rough, and a weary road been appointed you? Have sunbeams lit up your path, or have shadows, deep shadows, surrounded you? But man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward ;" and, therefore, I may conclude that you have had your share; nay, may be that, even now, your feet are among the briers,

it