of the greatest evils under the sun. It binds a man down to one little spot of earth when, perhaps, he longs to travel into distant parts, and visit foreign climes. It holds his attention to some few objects of thought or trains of investigation, when he longs to be seeking out and inter-meddling with all wisdom.' It compels his daily intercourse with uncongenial souls-unkindred spirits, when, had he leisure and resources at command, he could constantly move in society altogether agreeable to him. This everlasting necessity of labour, is often felt to be a cruel chain of bondage. Specially are the young apt to feel themselves fettered by this necessity. Their ardent imaginations and impulsive longings, revel in an elysium where leisure and gratification own neither restraint nor bound. Work, except as a spontaneous employment, wears, to their eye, no form of loveliness. Labour appears, in their visions of bliss, in the form of a haggard and ill-omened spectre, haunting them through all their pursuits of earthly joy. And it must be confessed, that the general prejudices of society, the contempt for work, the air of proud disdain to often cast upon the plodding sons of labour by the wealthier portions of society, together with the croakings of the idle and discontented, because they are compelled to renew their daily task, are great stumbling blocks cast in the way of young people at the very outset of their career.

But, upon reflection, it very certainly appears that work, in the sense we have defined it, constitutes, in its progress and results, the chief part of our earthly inheritance. It supplies our greatest share of happiness; it yields us nearly all our comforts; it prevents us from falling into the direst calamities, and is the ascent by which we climb to all that is dignified and ennobling under the sun. Work, in its most abstract conception, is man in action: the body or the mind, or both together, vigorously prosecuting some useful end.

That labour, though originally inflicted upon man as a curse, and so often regarded as the bane of life, is, nevertheless, one of our greatest blessings, admits of easy proof by the following considerations:

1. We are dependant upon it, in great measure, for our daily happiness. It is true, that many sources combine their influences in every case of real enjoyment, but work, in some of its forms, is generally found to be an indispensable condition of permanent pleasure. Bodily health is much promoted by vigorous and regular exertion; and good health gives to the mind a keen relish for all that is agreeable, so that a hale and strong constitution tastes all the innocent pleasures of life with a double delight, and is, in addition, capable of compassing a much larger amount. A form of evil, which often results from indolence, is mental depression. A heavy weight of uneasiness and anxiety accumulates upon the heart, and a dark cloud of forebodings comes lowering over the mind. Let that person arise and work, moderately, perhaps, at first, but perseveringly, and the load will soon be lightened; the darkness will begin to disperse, and rays of hope, in smiling beauty, will break in upon the midnight of the soul.

Exposure and excessive fatigue no doubt bring on disease, and, sometimes, a premature death. But it is equally true that some of the most inveterate forms of human infirmity are the result of bodily inaction. Health, in its fullest and most frequent realization, is to be found amongst those classes who regularly follow some active employment. 0 2

VOL. II.

Let the health become impaired, and there is no earthly thing which can compensate for the loss. Society will not do it. None of the luxuries of affluence will do it; for in order to enjoy these a man must first be in good health and spirits.

Further, labour is directly conducive to happiness. Activity of body and of mind are, in themselves, enjoyments. Most persons are happy only when employed in some serious and useful avocation. Give them nothing to do, and the time hangs heavily on their hands. They feel that life is a weariness and a burden. Instead, therefore, of shrinking from labour, we ought cheerfully to engage in it, and conscientiously to pursue it as an indispensable condition of our earthly well-being.

2. Then, labour is the instrumental cause of our chief comforts. Beyond the air we breathe, the water we drink, the sky, and the clouds, and the varied earth on which we look, and the sweet singing of birds which salutes our ears, there is scarcely one thing which we value that is not the product of labour. Indeed all material objects are the produce of labour. For we read that "the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that in them is." "And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made." Every thing, therefore, in nature, pleasant and useful to man, is the product of Divine operation. The fact, therefore, that God wrought in the creation of all things, and that he "worketh hitherto" in providence, should dignify labour in our esteem. But a lower consideration sometimes takes a firmer hold upon us than the highest, therefore we remark that the commonest necessaries of life, as well as all luxuries, are supplied by persevering labour. We should be destitute of house and clothing, should have neither food nor fuel, if man had not first la boured to procure these things. The chief difference in the external circumstances of men is a difference which labour has wrought. The combined energies of one class of workmen, in the course of months or years, raise up the stately hall or the magnificent palace. Then the ge nius and taste of others are employed in its decoration. The productions of many workshops, in remote parts of the country, are collected and ar ranged that all its departments may be furnished with every article of convenience, elegance, and comfort. And thus the monthly labours of scores or of hundreds of men are accumulated on one spot, and constitute the chief superiority of one man's external condition over that of another. It is the labour of man which spreads our table with food, which protects us by night and by day from the cold and the tempest, which provides the chief means of travelling; in short, what convenience have we in this world of exposure and want, which industry and genius have not produced.

Not only do our bodily comforts chiefly proceed from labour, but also those higher pleasures, which belong peculiarly to the mind, are derived, in great degree, from the same source. There is no book that ever led forth our thoughts into the field of science, or unfolded before us the history of past ages,-no poem has ever thrilled our souls with delight, that did not occasion its author hours, or days, or years of persevering la bour. All those monuments of genius in the departments of painting and statuary, of architecture and music, and whatever is delightful to an imaginative and cultivated taste, have been given to the world as the re sult of painstaking and continuous industry.

All the remedies, to which we resort in an hour of sickness, have been discovered, and elaborated, and tested by long processes of investigation and experiment. The institutions of our land, which give to Britain its stability, its happiness, and its glory, owe their origin and their efficiency to judicious and devoted operation. The hope of a benighted and degraded world rests, under God, upon untiring activity and consecrated labour. It is in this way that the blessings of civilization, of enlarged education and knowledge, and, equally also, of evangelical truth and holiness, are now so extensively diffused. Let the efforts of men cease in any department, even for a short time, and a shock is felt, more or less, through the entire social fabric. Let all human exertion be suspended, even for a single week, and the inevitable result would be starvation and death to nine-tenths of our race. On the one hand, let every member of society be daily labouring to produce something useful to himself and others, and ten thousand rills of comfort, from all sides, begin to pour forth their contributions to swell the tide of human enjoyment. Hence the more of industry there is in a community, the greater and more numerous will be their comforts and enjoyments. And in this way the primal curse of labour is turned into a blessing.

2. Then labour is also one of our chief safeguards against evil. Idleness is the fostering parent of vice and crime, of mental incapacity and bodily weakness.

"Satan finds some mischief still

For idle hands to do."

The immediate consequence of sloth, to most persons, is straitened circumstances, pecuniary embarrassment,-poverty. Few persons, after the age of childhood, can find the means of support, unless they begin to make themselves useful to society. The drones are cast out of the hive. Very few will labour for others, unless they get something valuable from them in return. The ordinance of the Lord is, that if any man will not work neither shall he eat; and this is an ordinance so just and necessary, that men very readily enforce its observance or inflict its penalty. No doubt there is poverty in the world which cannot be traced altogether to indolence, because extravagant indulgence and ill health help to produce it; but, except in the comparatively few cases of wealthy possession, sloth and idleness will most certainly reduce persons to extreme want. Solomon observed this connection in his day, and his words are applicable to man in all ages and climes :-"A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep. So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth; and thy want as an armed man." God and man are the allied and sworn enemies of the sluggish and idle, and they cannot escape.

Then those who have no serious occupation, are hourly exposed to the seductions of vice. Such sensual indulgencies as lie within their reach they are ever tempted to resort to, and, at the same time, being destitute of the means of gratifying their craving appetites, any opportunity of purloining their neighbours' goods, or of taking advantage of the unwary, is a strong temptation to steal. A dishonest course once entered upon, soon proves itself the high road to ruin. Step after step leads the culprit first to the police station, then to the county gaol, thence to the hulks or a

foreign land; and the labour which he would not voluntary pursue in the home of his forefathers, he is condemned to yield under privation and suffering, in a condition of degraded vassalage and thraldom.

The evil is much greater than that part of it which touches the body. The mind and the heart undergo a corresponding degradation. What range of thought, what elevation of idea, can an idle person ever attain to? What generous sentiment, what humane feeling, can we expect will obtain more than a transient existence in his heart? He will find himself in antagonism with the best and the greatest part of mankind. Consequently he will regard them with suspicion and envy, which again will, most likely, engender hatred. Thus he will come to see everything through a false medium. All things will wear to him an aspect of distortion. Good will appear evil, and evil good. The society of the upright and intelligent will be to him offensive, and he will, therefore, herd himself with the unprincipled, the discontented, the sottish, and the low. He becomes the victim of his own folly, bound and fettered by his own evil habits; at the same time he is preyed upon by the lusts and tempers of his own corrupted heart, so that in the expressive language of Solomon, "The desire of the slothful killeth him; for his hands refuse to labour."

4. Persevering industry, then, is a safeguard against many of the evils which beset our earthly course, it is also a necessary condition in the attainment of all that is great and dignified under the sun. There are some artificial and accidental distinctions which divide class from class, and persons from persons, that, nevertheless, serve in no degree to enhance man's personal worth. A man is none the worse for being the descendant of wealthy ancestors, and none the better for being cradled in obscurity and want. Nor, on the other hand, is the peasant's child inherently and essentially inferior to the offspring of the most distinguished nobleman in the land. Personal worth and real dignity are not estimated by the wise according to the circumstances into which men are born. We involuntary inquire after what men have done, whether they have distinguished themselves by any brilliant or useful performances. And the palm of honour is awarded to that man who, as the result of prolonged exertion, has surmounted obstacles, triumphed over adversaries, and toiled his way upward to the proud eminence of fame. Every man of substantial worth in the nation, has become so, mainly through the plodding labours of his industry. Original genius has something to do in making men great; but mere capability never yet constituted a man truly great. It is neither mind nor muscle that we admire in a fellow mortal, but their energies put forth, and sustained in a course of wise and beneficial operations. We judge of men by their works. We ourselves are judged of by our works. All past generations are tried by this criterion,—all future ages will be brought unto it; and no honour is genuine or durable which does not repose upon the foundation of earnest and persevering labour. No man rises to eminence in any department, whether we take the common walks of ordinary business or the more secluded bowers of science whether we examine the schools and discussions of philosophy, or the more public labours of political and judicial pursuits, not a single man of real importance and essential worth shall we meet with, who has not become so mainly by self-denying and laborious exertion. It is not every

one, truly, whose position gives him the opportunity of becoming very distinguished in any department of life; but there is scarcely a person born into the world, who might not, by a constant putting forth of ALL his energies, render himself of importance and consideration in the community where he resides. Some should own him as a valuable member of society -pay to him the tribute of respect while living, and speak of his memory in words of kindness and commendation when departed. It is, then, some useful and constant employment which supplies us with a large share of our daily happiness-which' yields us nearly all the necessaries and comforts of life which daily defends us against a troop of formidable evils, and which ever leads us onward towards the attainment of some worthy and honourable distinction.

Let not work, therefore be esteemed a degradation, a low, dishonourable condition of earthly existence. It may be allowed that some occupations are more desirable than others; still it is not the office and social position a man occupies that gives dignity to his character, or yields happiness to his heart, but the degree of conscientiousness and efficiency with which his duties are discharged. Success is satisfaction, and satisfaction is happiness. Success, in one endeavour nerves the soul, and lays the foundation for success in another. And the youth, who enters upon life with the determination to plod on until he succeeds, never to quit an undertaking until it is fairly and well accomplished, will find himself gradually advancing toward the summit of his highest reasonable aspirations, and may hope, before he die, to demonstrate to the world that "Labour con quers all things."

The highest results of persevering industry may be, and, alas, commonly are, entirely lost by a wrong or defective motive vitiating every effort that is put forth. "The labours of this mortal life" have a sublimer tendency, if conducted with proper feelings, than any we have yet mentioned. They bear a relation to God, to heaven, to eternity. Their importance and issues will not cease with time. When the earth, and the works that are therein, shall be burned up,' the soul, with all the habits of thought and frames of feeling it has indulged in, its encounter with earthly ill and discharge of earthly duty, will live on. Then it will stand face to face before the righteous and omniscient Judge. Then it will receive according to the deeds done in the body, whether good or bad. A blessed issue awaits a certain class of mankind against that day. Those who lived and died in the fear, the faith, and love of the Lord, will 'rest from their labours, and their works will follow them.' Each one will be presented with the rights and honours of citizenship in the heavenly Jerusalem. "They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; neither shall the sun light on them, nor any heat. For the Lamb, which is in the midst of the throne, shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." Seeing, then, that time is inseparably connected with eternity, that the soul which came from God must go to God, and that we all shall be judged according to our works, how natural is the inquiry, and how earnestly should we all pursue it, "What shall we do that we might work the works of God?"

(To be Continued.)