It must not only hold out truth to the reverence of those who belong to it, but it must enlist their feelings and affections in its cause, and attach them to its interests by the objects it proposes, and the pursuits and employments it encourages. An association which is to be beneficial to young men, which is to endeavour, under God's blessing, to arrest and fix the buoyant spirit, the active mind of youth, must have something more than principle to recommend it. It must have objects of pursuit, at harmony with the principles it professes, and adapted to the tastes and temperament of its members. It must propose topics of enquiry calculated to catch the imagination, and to touch the heart, as well as to exercise the intellect and satisfy the conscience. It must assimilate itself in some degree to the character of the age, which it is endeavouring to improve. It must be active, and aggressive, and communicative. It must have objects of strong and stirring interest before it; and it must invite general co-operation as the means of general improvement. Association without some pursuit of this kind would soon stagnate, and the effect of stagnation is corruption. But with objects of this kind proposed, and made the real matters of enquiry and pursuit to every one included in the body, it would appear that a spirit of vitality might be maintained in an association, which should secure the union of all connected with it, by giving to all a common interest in the employments which it suggests, and by awakening feelings and tendencies which would lead to real and willing cooperation.

Unless some qualities of this sort be infused into the plan, it may be excellent and good, but it will not be sufficient to retain the ardent spirit of youth within its bounds; and the mere impatience of our nature will lead the young, however well-principled and well-disposed they may at first appear to be, to seek for more congenial resources in other pursuits. But I also feel, while suggesting this, that the adoption of such objects

of pursuit for an association may be recommended on much higher ground than that of their expediency, or indirect tendency to consolidate its union. Christianity is in itself an active, energising system; it acts wherever it exists, and it implies activity in all who belong to it. Sloth, indolence, are not only indirectly, but directly condemned by the Gospel; and that love which is the distinguishing feature of the christian character, is the only quality which will never rest, because it never ceases to have an object, towards which it can be directed.

Wherever the christian life exists therefore, it will manifest itself by action. It will see good which ought to be done, and it will make haste to do it. It will see evil, which ought to be removed, and it will count the time lost which intervenes before it is done. Innumerable ways are discovered in which the will of God may be done, as soon as the heart is open to a sense of his love; and the discovery of the way in which it may be done, leads to the endeavour to do it. There are those who sorrow, e. g. and who need comfort, and who may be comforted. There are the ignorant who need instruction, and who should be instructed. The whole world, described but too justly, as lying in the wicked one, presents to the Christian's eye a field of labour almost indefinite in extent; a rebel region, to be reduced to subjection to its rightful Lord; a kingdom where disaffection prevails, and where the loyalty of the faithful has hourly opportunities for exercise; where the sovereign is to be confessed under every variety of opposition, but where not a step can be taken without some call on the allegiance of his subjects. O how little do men know of the real character of the world, or of their own condition in it, who think that they are justified in resolving to float down the stream of circumstances without self-denial or exertion! How little do they know of what the Gospel is, who think that it can ever be adapted to the world's taste; or that those who belong

to the world can cordially receive it! The world's enmity may be concealed from fear, or its enmity may sleep when not irritated by contact; but the hatred which it bears to the truth is a perfect hatred: and experience compels us to say, that where two principles exist so irreconcileable with each other as that of the Gospel and the world, no man can belong to both, and be at peace with each; but the Friendship of the world must ever be Enmity with God.

But if the world in which we live is to be considered as a field of labour, a field of warfare; a field where the Christian sees neither rest nor security, and does not wish to find more of the first than is consistent with the second; what a space does it not offer to his spirit for exertion and improvement? On every side opportunities of doing good present themselves! Wherever he lifts his eye, openings are observed. At home, abroad, the heathen population of distant lands, the hardly less heathenish population of his own; the rising generation, the departing generation; the great brotherhood of mankind, groaning under the general burden of the flesh; the brotherhood of the faith groaning under the trials of the spirit-what a world is open to a heart, which is willing to look out from itself, and to receive the cry of suffering that proceeds from others! At present, nothing but the deliberate determined selfishness of the world prevents that cry from being heard, and being felt. Men, fearful that their own comforts will be encroached on, that their attention will be forcibly withdrawn from their own concerns to those of others, think it necessary to close their ears against appeals, which they feel would be irresistible if listened to; and determine to do nothing, lest they should be tempted to do too much. Conscious that it is difficult to be temperate, they resolve on being abstinent; and become selfish on principle, that they may not be indiscreet through sentiment. The remedy is worse than the disease. Scylla is more destructive than Charybdis. In forming

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their principles of practice, they forget that christian benevolence carries with it the means of regulating and correcting itself; and they forget that the tendency of human nature will always be in favour of self; and that it is not necessary to encourage, and to strengthen inclinations which have already got possession of the heart. They lose sight of these truths, which the Bible is continually impressing; and thinking that their danger lies on the side where they are safest, they are jealous of every call which leads them to consider others rather than themselves.

The loss that they incur, the injury they do to themselves by this unreasonable caution, is not easily described. The man who is afraid of loving his neighbour as himself, who thinks that every thing done for others, or given to others, is subtracted from himself; and who conceives that self-defence requires him to be selfish, hard-hearted, and uncharitable; will unquestionably accomplish his object, will succeed in overcoming those weaknesses of his nature, which prompt sympathy with others. He will pursue his course of self-aggrandisement, steadily and safely; but he will as surely learn by melancholy experience at the end, that he who lives for himself alone, lives to be disappointed; and that man can only be happy through the reflection of the happiness of others.

Were it not for this unhappy delusion, which leads man to shrink from sympathy as endangering his own peace, and which makes the law of self-defence ride over that law which bids us love our neighbour as ourselves; the fearful anomaly which prevails in the world, that unequal distribution of the means of comfort which impeaches the goodness and even the justice of the Deity; would not show itself in such vast and monstrous proportions. We should not see some drunken and others starving, at a feast to which the Lord of all has invited all. We should not be shocked by observing the extremes of man's social state in close juxta-position;

squalid poverty contiguous to pompous luxury; Lazarus covered with sores, lying at the gate of one, clothed in purple, and faring sumptuously; but we should behold a very different state of things. We should see poverty, wherever it existed without crime, alleviated by the benevolence of the rich; and wealth sanctified by sympathy with the poor. We should see knowledge made useful by being applied to purposes of general usefulness; and learning rescued from its abuse by being employed in communicating its treasures or discoveries to others. All these effects would come from the encouragement of that feeling, which we wish to see made general; the feeling for others as for ourselves; but no class of society need this influence more strongly, or would be more really benefited by it than the young.

It may perhaps surprise the young to be told, that selfishness is a vice against which they have to watch: that it is a sin that doth most easily beset them; and they may be ready to cite the characteristic thoughtlessness and ardour of youth as disproving the assertion. Reflection however will prove, that ardour of pursuit, if it be not under special controul, naturally gives rise to selfishness, and that thoughtlessness almost universally proceeds from it. The child is thoughtless of his parent's wishes, because he is absorbed in his own. The truant boy is thoughtless of the lapse of time, because he is occupied in his play; and thinks, while so employed, of nothing but his own amusement. Each of these, if they felt for others, would think of others; and they are merely forgetful of duty, because they care for nothing but self-indulgence. Every thing therefore which draws the young ont of themselves, and leads them to think of others, or to care for others, is a moral gain. Every thing that interests the youthful mind in the welfare of others, is not only a positive good, but it is a negative to incalculable evil. It not only opens the heart to the influence of "things lovely and of good report;" but it withdraws the heart from the influence of things of a contrary character; and by an