quickness in his motions. Though studying closely, extremely abstemious, and taking little exercise, he was healthy even to old age. We have already admitted that there was in his character a disposition to monastic severity, which he evidently admired, though tender and indulgent in the extreme towards the different characters and habits of those more cheerfully disposed. We shall probably feel little inclined to admire, still less to imitate these peculiarities; nor is it necessary we should do either: but they are subjects neither of ridicule nor censure, as some falsely imagine. If Leighton seldom or never smiled, it was not assuredly that he thought it a sin to smile; we find nowhere throughout all his writings the least attempt to check the innocent hilarity of lighter hearts-If he abstained from every sort of indulgence, it was not from an idea of merit attached to these privations-for we never ind him exhorting others to the same practices. They are attributable either to natural character, and constitutional gravity, or to a persuasion, of which none but himself could be the judge, that such a mode of living and acting was the most fitted to preserve in his bosom that calm devotedness and heavenly peace, which were the enjoyments he alone coveted, the only possessions he valued. They who censure his choice may make a worse-while it is most certain that though acting so differently from most other men, he never censured them for any thing but sin. There is not in all his invaluable writings the least tone of harshness, or austerity, or peculiarity in unimportant matters.

The Works of Leighton are not very voluminous. His Commentary on St. Peter is the best known, but there are many other Lectures and Meditations on different parts of Scripture with various detached pieces, of equal excellence. His Rules and Instructions for a Holy Life have been much commented on, and by some thought to go beyond what the powers of nature can reach, even when assisted by divine grace. We believe they do so-but we need not fear to fix our aim too

high, though at last we must come short of it. Leighton meant to portray a life and conduct perfectly holy, which is every Christian's desire and aim, though he knows certainly he can reach it but in heaven. Leighton knew it too—but he had an object to hold up and the path to point out; that object was holiness, and he drew it as he conceived of it; and the more nearly his Rules and Instructions could be followed, the more holy would be the life of those for whom he wrote it.

The works of Leighton are of a class so deeply serious, that we can scarcely expect they should become the reading of very young persons: but to those of serious minds and confirmed religious feeling, there are perhaps none in our language of equal value.

REFLECTIONS

ON SELECT PASSAGES OF SCRIPTURE.

I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.-MALACHI, iii. 6.

WE change our minds daily, hourly-every purpose of our souls is vacillating as the inconstant winds. At night we resign ourselves, with many a vow, and many a noble resolution, to the will divine-in the morning we wake mournful and dissatisfied, and determined to resist it. Or in the morning we go forth in holy determination to serve our God and resist evil-the temptation meets us, the dissipating influence of things present possesses our minds, and ere 'tis night again, God is forgotten and evil is indulged, and the holy determination is all forgotten. We pledge to Him our hearts, and we take them back to set them on something else we offer to resign to him whatever he demands, and when he takes it, we raise a cry for our toys and refuse to be comforted. Why are we not consumed in our falseness and

inconstancy? Because He changes not. Having loved us once, He loves us always-having pitied us once, he pities us for ever-having died to save us He cannot change his mind. If his purpose varied as much as ours, we should soon be destroyed in his anger, and consumed for our treachery; and the only reason that we are not so, is because his purpose is one and unchanged, while ours is hourly vacillating. He knew what we were when he resolved to have mercy on us-He knew what we should do when He promised to spare us. The world itself and all that it contains, had surely ere this been consumed in their corruption, could He who preserves it be provoked to change his purpose of forbearing mercy and redeeming love.

Then shall ye return and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God, and him that serveth him not.-MALACHI, iii. 18.

It is all confusion to our senses now: the utmost we can do, and sometimes scarcely that, is to discern for ourselves whether we be righteous or wicked; and looking around as on the world, while we see on one hand the dark alloy with which all goodness is assailed, and on the other the brilliant qualities that adorn the unhallowed spirit, we scarcely may determine which is the dross and which the gold. And if we could, the maze were not yet unravelled-great as may be the difference in their character, where is the difference of their condition? The sun-beam falls on one as kindly as on the other Nature unlocks her stores, and science pours forth her treasures, and art plies her fingers as much for the wicked as for the righteous. They who serve not God at all, take as largely of his bounties to all appearance here, as they who serve him truly. But hereafter we shall discern. The tinsel garb that veils the unholy bosom, the fair pretext that covers the evil purpose, the brilliant wit that disguises the dangerous maxim, the false morality that puts the approbation and

the opinions of men in the stead of those of God, will be all withdrawn. And withdrawn also, blotted out and purified, will be the evil habit that overcomes the honest purpose, the unseemly swervings of the heaven-directed spirit, the blemishes that darken the devoted heart. And with these will disappear our strange miscalculations of good and ill while the unworthy possessors of this world's good begin with shame to take the lowest seat, the despised, the unfortunate, the seemingly neglected children of their God, will show themselves what they are, claimants and possessors of immortal bliss.

Beni soit le Dieu et le Père de notre Seigneur JesusChrist, le Père des miséricordes, et le Dieu de toute consolation.-2 CORINTH. i. 3.

DIEU n'est pour les pécheurs un Père de miséricorde, un Dieu de consolation, que parcequ'il est Dieu et Père de Jésus-Christ, et que depuis qu'il nous a aimés en lui, et qu'il l'a puni et affligé pour nous, nous devons tout espérer pour de lui. Il y a des miséricordes et des consolations de plus d'une sorte; des miséricordes douces, et des miséricordes amères; des consolations sensibles pour les foibles, et des consolations toutes spirituelles, et selon la foi pour les forts. Telles que soient les nôtres; c'est assez de savoir qu'elles nous viennent de celui qui est notre Dieu et notre Père; il est juste de lui en laisser le choix.

QUESNEL.

Commune with your own heart on your bed, and be

still.-PSALM iv. 4.

How few do this! Men live abroad, and are indeed strangers at home; the great mark of human madness, to delight in speaking and hearing of what concerns others, while no single person will attempt to descend into himself. Yet this faculty, which we call reflection, is the peculiar privilege of human nature, and to be borne on wholly by external objects, is indeed bruta

If, amidst all your other studies, you do not learn to converse and commune with your own selves, whatever you know, or rather whatever you imagine you know, I would not purchase it at the expense of a straw. It is an excellent advice of Pythagoras, and the verses that contain it, do indeed deserve to be called golden, "That we should not sleep, till we have seriously revolved the actions of the day, and asked ourselves, what have I done amiss? What good have I done, or neglected to do? that so we may reprove ourselves for what has been wrong, and take the comfort of what has been as it ought," "And be still."-This refers not so much to the tongue as to the mind; for what does an external silence signify, if the inward affections be turbulent? A sedate and composed mind is necessary, in order to know God and ourselves. Such wisdom both deserves and demands a vacant soul; it will not, as it were, thrust itself into a corner, nor inhabit a polluted and unquiet breast. God was not in the whirlwind, nor in the fire, but in the still small voice. The wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable; and in that blessed country to which it teaches us to aspire, there is the most perfect and everlasting cohabitation of purity and peace.

LEIGHTON.

Qu'elle est grande la miséricorde du Seigneur! C'est un asile certain pour tous ceux qui se tournent vers elle. ECCLUS. xvii. 29.

Que tardons-nous à nous jeter dans la profondeur.de cet abîme? Plus nous nous perdrons avec une confiance pleine d'amour, plus nous serons en état de nous sauver. Donnons nous à Dieu sans réserve, et ne craignons rien. Il nous aimera, et nous l'aimerons. Son amour, croissant chaque jour, nous tiendra lieu de tout le reste. Il remplira lui seul tout notre cœur, que le monde avoit énivré, agité, troublé, sans pouvoir jamais le remplir: il nous ôtera ce qui nous rend malheureux: il ne nous fera mépriser que le monde que