form to his precepts; and many who repeat 'Lord, Lord!' and claim to be his special and favourite disciples, would find themselves objects of his sternest indignation and most withering rebukes. The race of Pharisees and priests and false teachers is not extinct; they would again treat their Master with contempt and scorn, or utter neglect, if his associations were among the poor and lowly.

What, then, is to be done? No violent revolution is required. No despot is to be hunted from his place; no blood is to be shed; no legislation is indispensable; no new sect in religion or philosophy need be formed, nor, in the first instance, need any one desert the position in which Providence has placed him. What is required is, that every one who is, or who believes himself to be, a true disciple of Christ, should at once resolve so far as in his power, and so far as he might be favoured with divine aid, to live in this world according to the teachings of his Master. As soon as the great law of doing to others as we would

others should do to us begins to be exemplified, the reign of wrong, and injury, and extreme suffering will come rapidly to an end. Instead of one Howard, one Mrs. Fry, and one Miss Dix in a century, we should have thousands upon thousands, in every department of charity. When we look at what these three individuals have accomplished, what might we not expect from millions labouring with united strength and intellect in the great work of human welfare?

As soon as the law of charity is fulfilled on an extensive scale, in all its Christian beauty and loveliness, the world will pause to admire and believe and imitate. The apostles as well as their great Master mingled their preaching with incessant care of the poor and the suffering; it should be so now. Christians may not fold their arms, and be inactive, because there is an almshouse, a poorhouse, or a benevolent society. There should be no suffering within the reach of any Christian that he can relieve or alleviate,

without making the attempt. It is not Christianity to attend weekly in the stately church and well-cushioned pew, to hear expositions of difficult passages of Scripture, while there is an utter failure to perform duties which are so plainly enjoined that the dullest intellect can comprehend. Nor does the most punctual attendance upon the Sundayschool, or upon lectures or weekly meetings for prayer, make up for neglect of the higher duties of charity. If the preacher and people in our rich and well-ordered congregations were, in the midst of the gravest sermon, suddenly visited from on high with a deep and adequate conception of their transgressions of the law of charity, and of the duties which they owe to those who are outside of the church; if they were made to realize the great contrast between their condition and that of those who were abroad and around them, their seats would in a moment become insupportable, and they would rush in a mass, preacher and people, from their splendid

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edifice, to the courts and alleys and cellars, to the abodes of destitution, ignorance, crime, and suffering. They would carry succour for present wants; and all would become teachers of the way of life. In vain do we preach, and in vain do we teach, unless we carry obedience to what we do understand, into our lives; our progress in knowledge of divine things must be limited by our actual progress in the practical duties of Christianity.

No people can ever fully comprehend Christianity but those who comply with its requisitions; and of course the world can never appreciate it until its laws of love are shown by example. This distinguishing feature of Christianity is that which Christians have most slighted. More attention has been given in our churches and Sunday-schools to Jewish manners, customs, ceremonies-to the ornaments of the tabernacle and temple-to breastplates and phylacteries, than to the obligations of brotherly kindness. There are fountains of tenderness in every human bosom;

they are not taught to gush forth and flow in streams which no harshness of this world can ever check there are chords of love in every breast; these are not taught to respond to every appeal for sympathy and succour.

The purest joys of earth, the exercise of the kindly affections, are nearly allied to the highest Christian duties of love to God and man. Rare indeed is it to find a soul so dead as to be insensible to kindness; and still more rare is it to find one in the exercise of kindness, who does not find the benefit of his good deeds. more than doubled in the happiness they reflect upon himself. Rare is it to find a heart so insensible as to be unmoved at even the recital of noble deeds of charity, goodness, and neighbourly kindness. In this great channel of charity the Deity has chosen, in his infinite mercy, to fix the sphere of our chief duties and our highest enjoyments. Here is scope for the employment of all our talents, and for the exercise of all good affections. Where all these come into full use, under the law of