Teach me to enjoy the blessings Thou bestowest upon me with gratitude, but with humility, knowing that they proceed entirely from thy undeserved goodness; and if Thou art pleased to resume them, assist me by thy Holy Spirit to repress every murmur, and to resign them with contented submission to Thy will, and the most perfect conviction, that, however bitter the affliction may be for the present, it is ordained in mercy for my good. If Thou triest me with sickness, may I bear it with patient fortitude, as inflicted by Thy hand. If Thou seest fit to remove from me the friends I delight in, I pray that Thou wouldst receive them into thy heavenly kingdom; and give me grace to pass a life of such purity and holiness here, that, when the time of my departure comes, I may yield up my spirit with the firmest hope and trust in Thee, and may be re-united to all I loved and valued whilst on earth; and grant that at the last day we may all attain to the resurrection of the Just, and have our perfect consummation in bliss, both in body and soul, in thy eternal and everlasting glory, through Jesus Christ our Lord; to whom, with Thee, and the Holy Ghost, be ascribed by us, as by angels and archangels, and the whole company of heaven, all honour and glory, world without end. Amen.

Saturday.

Love your enemies, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you.-MATT. v., 44. Walk in love, as Christ has also loved us.-EPHES. V., 2. Live in peace, and the God of Love and peace shall be with you.-2 COR. xiii., 11.

On Charity.

NOTHER essential qualifica tion in the Christian character is Charity; and of this we may be convinced if we examine the striking difference between the tenor of the Old and New Testament in this respect. The first partakes throughout of the spirit of the law delivered by Moses, which inculcated the severer duties of justice between man and man; and strict obedience to the commands of God, which obedience was chiefly shown in the observance of rites and ceremonies. Warnings the most awful, and denunciations of punishment the

most appalling, abound in every part; it is only when allusion is made to the Messiah and his kingdom that a milder spirit prevails.

But the Gospel contained in the New Testament is altogether a law of mercy, and its characteristics are beneficence and love: even the warnings against sin, and the exhortations to repentance, are not delivered with threatenings to alarm us, but with tenderness, and an anxious fear, lest by our own carelessness or wilful guilt we should lose the bright inheritance prepared for us. "God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved."

The life of our blessed Saviour was a continual example of charity: all his miracles were acts of compassion and loving-kindness: and in preaching forgiveness of injuries, forbearance, and universal good-will, he abolished the sterner law of Moses, which allowed of retaliation for evil," an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth ;" and gave to his followers a new commandment, that they should love one another. He announced himself at Nazareth as being sent to heal the broken-hearted, and to show forth his love for mankind by relieving their distresses. In his Sermon on the Mount, he says, that even acts of devotion are not acceptable to God if brotherly kindness is wanting: "First be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift."—In the same discourse he exhorts us to love even our enemies, to pray for those who persecute us-and why? That

we may be called the children of God. He enjoins us to give alms freely, and not to judge our brother's faults, but to do unto others as we would they should do unto us. When his disciples were sent to preach the gospel throughout Israel, he gave them particular directions to attend to the poor and the sick. When the disciples of John were sent to him to be convinced whether he was the Messiah or not, the proofs he gave of his divine mission were not of awful power and majesty, but he healed the infirmities of those who surrounded him, and desired the messengers to tell John what they had seen, as a convincing testimony of his being the Son of God by his acts of charity and compassion. When Peter inquired how far forgiveness of our brethren should extend, our Lord gave such an answer as proved that forgiveness should know no limits; and he pronounces a parable afterwards to declare, that, as our Father in Heaven has many trespasses to pardon in us, we shall bring upon ourselves his most awful punishments if we do not equally forgive our fellow-creatures. In another place, also, he desires that when we pray we should forgive if we "have aught against any," that we also may be forgiven. The necessity of charity and pity is again strongly enforced in our Saviour's answer to the young man who came to him to inquire the certain way to eternal life, boasting at the same time of his obedience to all the commands given by Moses: the answer he received,

and the subsequent observations of Christ to his disciples, imply that, unless he bestowed the riches committed to his charge in relieving the necessities of his brethren, he could hardly enter the kingdom of God, though his other duties were fulfilled: while, on the contrary, Zaccheus, also a rich man, claims favour, and obtains it, on the ground of his conduct towards his fellow-creatures-his justice and his charity. And in describing the final judgment, our Saviour exalts the virtue of charity, when he mentions that alone as entitling us to everlasting life; while the neglect of those amiable qualities which would have produced pity and brotherly kindness, draws down upon the wicked that dreadful sentence, " Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire." His last discourse to his disciples is full of entreaties to love one another; he breathed upon them the spirit of peace: "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give unto you ;" and he closed his life with a prayer for the forgiveness of his enemies.

The Apostles followed the example set them by their divine Master: the persecuting vehemence of St. Paul's natural character was softened into tenderness as soon as he became a disciple of Christ: He addresses all his converts in the most affectionate manner "as brethren;" he beseeches them, exhorts them, entreats them; even his sharpest reproofs are given with tender anxiety; he conforms to the weakness and infirmity of all, that he may gain all; he begins