brought into action, can form the character and mould the mind.

Perhaps there is no passage that throws more light upon the progress of sanctification than the comment by Bolingbroke upon Bacon which we partially quoted before, and which, as it may be considered superior to all the rest of Bolingbroke's works taken together, shall here be transcribed entire. "There is not a deeper nor a finer observation in all my Lord Bacon's works than one which I shall apply and paraphrase on this occasion. The most compendious, the most noble, and the most effectual remedy, which can be opposed to the uncertain and irregular motions of the human mind, agitated by various passions, allured by various temptations, inclining sometimes towards a state of moral perfection, and oftener even in the best, towards a state of moral depravation, is this. We must choose betimes such virtuous objects as are proportioned to the means we have of pursuing them, and as belong particularly to the stations we are in, and to the duties of those stations. We must determine and fix our minds in such manner upon them, that the pursuit of them may become the business, and the attainment of them the end of our whole lives. Thus we shall imitate the great operations of nature, and not the feeble, slow, and imperfect operations of art. We must not proceed in forming the moral character, as a statuary proceeds in forming a statue, who works sometimes on the face, sometimes on one part, and sometimes on another: but we must proceed, and it is in our power to proceed, as nature does in forming a flower, an animal, or any other of her productions; rudimenta partium omnium simul parit et producit. She throws out altogether, and at once, the whole system of every being, and the rudiments of all the parts.' The vegetable or the animal grows in bulk, and increases in strength; but is the same from the first."

It is from the ignorance of the great law of the decay of passive impressions, and the increase of active habits that many of the mistakes with regard to experimental religion proceed. In the first dawn of the religious life it is not so much the truth itself as the impression which the novelty of the truth makes upon our minds which is chiefly attended to. Accordingly this impression is thought to constitute the principal part of religion, and the great object is to retain and to increase it: But in pursuit of this object the most speedy course is taken to deaden that sensibility by the very means by which it is sought to be retained. The continual repetition of these passive impressions is the true method of entirely wearing them out. Then when truth can no longer excite the mind, novelty and exaggeration are naturally sought after to supply its place. Hence that fickleness in religious opinions, and those perpetual changes which the subjects of them are pleased successively to denominate conversions, and hence one new teacher after another is complimented by the same set of disciples, with bringing those out of darkness into light, who are ever learning and never coming to the stable and assured knowledge of the truth.

Let us not however undervalue strong impressions of religion upon the feelings, they are gratifying in themselves and highly useful as an impulse to enable us to proceed forward on our way. But the mind which seeks to rest in their barren contemplation and enjoyment will be miserably disappointed; they are but transitory refreshments on the journey, and only intended to lead us on to that better country of which they are slight foretastes. It cannot be too often repeated, that religion consists simply in conformity to the Divine will and likeness, and that other things may be pleasant accessaries but are not the essentials of our duty. Many are evidently seeking after comfort rather than truth, but the only true Com

forter is the Holy Spirit, who comforts us by means of the truth, who lays a deep foundation for heavenly joy by first convincing us of sin, that we may receive with earnestness the glad tidings when he testifies of the Saviour, and that we may welcome the Redeemer with all holy gratitude and affection, when we consider from what wrath and misery he hath delivered us. Above all, the Holy Spirit comforts us not so much with things present as things to come, when he draws us forward with joyful expectation towards futurity, and fills all the desires of the mind with the approaching prospect of heaven-with a hope full of glory and immortality.

PART VIII.

HEAVEN.

1. All Fleeting and Passing away without Us. 2. All becoming Fixed and Unalterable within. 3. Proximity of Heaven to the Believer. 4. The Believer saved by Hope. 5. Preparation of Heaven for the Believer. 6. Heaven the Rest and End of Existence. 7. Love of Life becomes the Love of Holiness. 8. Love of the Creator and Creation. 9. Love of the Saviour. 10. The Order and the Society of Heaven.

I. ALL things below are marked with the impress of a future and unchangeable state. Every thing is fleeting in itself, and permanent in its consequences.

As every being forms but a link in the extended chain of existence, so all the changes around us are passing into other changes till the series of vicissitudes is complete, and the transitory scenery of this world is shifted away. So rapidly are we hurried forwards to futurity, that we cannot realize present time, and we can only think of it as a movable line between two eternities, that which is Far from being able to

past, and that which is to come. retain possession of the moments that are so rapidly departing from us, our life in the continuance of its course, is severing us from all that is worth living for, not only from external advantages, but even the endowments of the mind which we would identify with ourselves; all that

remains to us is the result of time spent or mispent, and the expectation or the dread of Divine retribution. If man is regardless of the boundless ages of futurity, it is not from their being unfrequently suggested to his notice. Time, which mingles in every train of our thoughts, leads the mind as necessarily to eternity, as the course of a river conducts us to its termination in the ocean. The lapse of duration, without some sensible measure of it, would escape by the silence of its course from our observation. But not only do the changes around us warn us of our own approaching and final change, but the heavenly bodies are continual remembrancers to man of the shortness of his narrow existence, while they lead his thoughts onwards to the infinity of duration as well as of space; and while in their lesser movements they are for signs and for seasons, for days and for years, in their larger revolutions they carry on the mind at once into new and undiscovered heavens, and into the vast and never ending cycles of eternity.

There is a striking anomaly to the other benevolent provisions of a Deity, (so profusely discoverable in the works of creation,) in the apparent evanescence of pleasure, and the seeming endurance of pain. Had pleasures appeared to last longer than they actually do, and pains to be shorter than they really are, the final purpose of this arrangement would have been more easily perceived; but the opposite moral constitution suits well with the transitory and probationary state of man upon earth. Prolonged pleasures, upon which the soul would repose, are ill-suited to the progress of its pilgrimage, and pains which are intended for warnings appear greater than they are; and the dread of them, and consequently the impulse derived from them, is increased without increasing the amount of actual suffering. Hope is enduring though joy be fleeting, and it is less the presence of pain than the dread of future