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tempers as sleep does. So that a person that is a slave to this idleness is in the same temper when he is up; and though he is not asleep, yet he is under the effects of it; and every thing that is idle, indulgent, or sensual, pleases him, for the same reason that sleep pleases him; and, on the other hand, every thing that requires care, or trouble, or self-denial is hateful to him, for the same reason that he hates to rise. He that places any happiness in this morning indulgence, would be glad to have all the day made happy in the same manner; though not with sleep, yet with such enjoyment as gratifies and indulges the body in the same manner as sleep does; or at least, with such as come as near to it as they can. The remembrance of a warm bed is in his mind all the day, and he is glad when he is not one of those that sit starving in a church.

Now, you do not imagine that such a one can truly mortify that body which he thus indulges; yet you might as well think this as that he can truly perform his devotions, or live in such a drowsy state of indulgence, and yet relish the joys of a spiritual life.

For surely no one will pretend to say that he knows and feels the true happiness of prayers, who does not think it worth his while to be early at it.

It is not possible in nature for an epicure to be truly devout; he must renounce this habit of sensuality before he can relish the happiness of devotion.

Now, he that turns sleep into an idle indulgence does as much to corrupt and disorder his soul, to make it a slave to bodily appetites, and keep it incapable o all devout and heavenly tempers, as he that turns the necessities of eating into a course of indulgence.

A person that eats and drinks too much does not feel such effects from it as those do who live in notorious instances of gluttony and intemperance; but yet his course of indulgence, though it be not scandalous in the eyes of the world, nor such as torments his own conscience, is a great and constant hindrance to his improvement in virtue; it gives him eyes that see not, and ears that hear not; it creates a sensuality in the soul, increases the power of bodily passions, and makes him incapable of entering into the true spirit of religion.

Now this is the case of those who waste their time in sleep; it does not disorder their lives, or wound their conscience, as notorious acts of intemperance do; but like any other more moderate course of indulgence, it silently, and by smaller degrees, wears away the spirit of religion, and sinks the soul into a state of dulness and sensuality.

POETRY.

O thou afflicted, tossed with tempest, and not comforted," &c. Isa. liv. 11.

WHEN storms assail the mind,
When raging passions rise,

A remedy we find

In him who yonder lies,

All bathed in bloody sweat for thee,

To quell thy soul's worst agony.

In visions of the past,

Thus view thy Saviour's power,
And long as time shall last,

And long as storms shall lower,
He is the same and ever nigh,
To-day, and to Eternity!

He suffer'd in his soul,-
The "man of sorrows" he,
Yet could the waves control,
And he can comfort thee;
Whatever gusts upset thy mind
He can rebuke the raging wind.
Tempted and tossed with grief,
In heaviness and woe,

To him for thy relief,

To him for comfort go:

To Jesus who has died for thee,
Jesus, who lives to set thee free.

O'er heav'n and earth he reigns,
Thy interceding friend,

He suffer'd once thy pains

To bring them to an end:

An end that will be well for thee,
If thou to him for refuge flee.

The weary he invites,

The heavy laden soul;

Thy spirit he delights,

If wounded, to make whole;
If blind, to guard thee on thy way
From darkness to eternal day.

E'en now he calls thee home,
Thy home is at his feet,

To him then haste and come,

He will thee welcome greet;

And bid thee lay thy burden down,

And call himself and heaven thy home!

Purleigh Rectory.

R. F. W.

Rev. H. A. SIMCOE, Penheale-Press, Cornwall.

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What should I say more of the Scriptures, how profitable and comfortable they be in all cases and parts of our life? In adversity, in prosperity, in life, and in death, they are our special comfort. If we must fight, they are a sword; if we hunger, they are meat; if we thirst, they are drink; if we have no dwelling-place, they are a house; if we be naked, they are a garment; if we be in darkness, they be light unto our going.

They are comfortable to Kings, to subjects, to old men, to young men, to man and to wife, to father and to child, to master and to servant, to captain and

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soldier, to preacher and people, to the learned, to the unlearned, to the wise and to the simple.

They are comfortable in peace, in war, in heaviness, in joy, in health and sickness, in abundance, in poverty, in the day time, in the night season, in the town, in the wilderness, in company, and when thou art alone. For they teach faith, hope, patience, charity, sobriety, humility, righteousness, and all godliness. They teach us to live, and they teach us to die.

Therefore hath Paul said well, "The whole Scripture is profitable:" it is full of great comfort; it maketh the man of God absolute and perfect unto all good works; perfect in faith, perfect in hope, perfect in the love of God and of his neighbour; perfect in his life, and perfect in his death : so great, so large, and ample, and heavenly, is the profit which we do reap by the word of God.

Now it followeth, that we consider how necessary and needful it is for us to be guided by the word of God in the whole trade of our life. The word of God is that unto our souls which our soul is unto our body. As the body dieth when our soul departeth, so the soul of man dieth when it hath not the knowledge of God. "Man liveth not by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." (Deut. viii. 3.)

Behold, saith God (Amos viii. 11.)"I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst of water, but of hearing the word of the Lord." Their tongue shall wither, their heart shall starve, they shall die for hunger. " They shall wander from sea to sca; and from the north unto the cast shall they run to and fro to seek the word of the

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