forms of human society, the mere outward aspect of this portion of the Creator's empire is beautified or improved, are to be considered as instruments for the advancement of his kingdom, to the extent, at least, in which these improvements are real and per manent. In the same manner all the arts and sciences by means of which the aspect of life is bettered, or its enjoyments enhanced,—all the political and social institutions which contribute to its gradual amelioration and security,-every thing, in a word, that helps to raise the nature of man in the scale of social life,—or to give him a taste for enjoyments above the mere gratifications of sense, are instruments employed by the infinite wisdom of Providence for carrying on the plan according to which the vast arrangements of this department of the Divine dominions are conducted, and are never viewed by us in their true and noblest character but when they assume this aspect to our thoughts, and are actually employed by us under this impression. These all are means actually efficient in the arrangements of Providence, to the extent in which, by their instrumentality, the general aspect of na ture and of life is bettered and adorned;—and were this direct operation their only effect, our widest and justest views of the great arrangements of Providence would dispose us to assign to them, willingly, the important character we have now been claiming for them. But it is also to be kept in view, that, besides their direct operation, they have a mediate influence on all the higher faculties and tendencies of human nature;-that thus the "kingdom of God" cannot be bettered in any form or degree without a corresponding improvement taking place in some of the higher and nobler aspects of it with which the lower improvements are connected ;-and that hence a beautiful display is opened up to us of the unity of that scheme by which the government of God, for the good of this world, is carried forward,—and a new glory thrown over even the humblest improvements, by means of which the general aspect of life or of nature is exalted. 2. Thus much it seemed proper to observe, even with respect to what we commonly consider as the lowest form of the Divine kingdom, and the humblest instruments by which its advancement can be promoted. As, however, we more commonly appropriate the phrase, "the kingdom of God," to the mo ral and spiritual interests of human nature,-that is to say, to those nobler aspects and tendencies of our nature which give to it its high place and characteristic attributes,—we may now proceed to remark, that, even when our observations are confined more exclusively to this aspect of the divine kingdom, the means employed for its advancement are still to be regarded as varied and manifold. We are in the habit of using certain phrases or peculiar modes of expression when speaking of these higher aspects of human nature,—phrases founded on distinctions or abstractions which have become current in the world,-but the use of which has a tendency to perplex our views whenever we aim at such simplifications or at such an extent of prospect as are suitable to the subject with which we are at present occupied. Considering, then, the words, the moral and religious nature of man,—or more generally his spiritual interests or spiritual nature, as intended to denote simply those higher aspects of his nature by which he is raised above the other inhabitants of this world, and fitted for making indefinite advances, and for holding fellowship with higher and invisible beings,-the means by which this portion of his nature is advanced are plainly as manifold as the instruments by which, in any form or degree, he is enabled to separate truth from error,-virtue from vice,-good from evil,-that which is pleasing to God from that which is displeasing to Him;—to identify these perceptions with his own rules of conduct;—and thus gradually to become, in the strict sense of the expression, wiser and better. Hence all the helps which have been afforded man for the knowledge and practice of his duty, either in his own progressive experience of life, in serious reflections on his own feelings, and views, and place in existence,-in intercourse with other partakers of the same nature who may have had a longer experience of life, or more extensive means of observation,—or, finally, in the lessons furnished by the history of the generations or individuals who have gone before him ;-all those excellent maxims which have been published by the eminently good and wise of former times, and which have had an extensive influence upon the conduct or views of the generations by which they have been succeeded;those political institutions also, which, when wisely framed and judiciously administered, have at all times so powerful, and general, and permanent an influence upon the most important interests of those who are subjected to them ;—all the religious institutions or more extraordinary dispensations which have so direct a connexion with the highest and most spiritual of all our capacities, and the tendency of which is to carry those capacities to still higher improvements;-every means, in short, by the instrumentality of which the individuals and the races of men have been led to form better and purer ideas of their situation in existence,-of the Being who formed them,—of the duty which they owe for the existence they have received,—and of the yet greater prospects that are opened to their ambition in other departments or manifestations of the kingdom of God on which they are hereafter to enter :— All of these, from their influence in raising and bettering the nobler capacities and hopes of human nature, are to be considered as means employed by Divine Providence for the advancement of his kingdom, when that kingdom is considered under that higher sense of the expression in which we are now using it-whether these means are more directly connected with religious dispensations, or result only from the influence of causes of a more common and ordinary description;—and according |