What may we learn from these particular considerations?

We may learn that each part has its place, its office, its use, in the great whole of creation; that the order of the whole is formed by each part being in its own place, and performing its own office :-if then, we are ever so minute and insignificant, still we have our time, our place, and our office in the immense scale of creation. These are not chosen by ourselves, but appointed by God; and we cannot either go out of our sphere, or refuse to perform the office allotted to us, without violating the laws of eternal wisdom and order.

What general reflections may the view we have taken produce?

We may take occasion to adore the wisdom, and goodness of God, in the creation of the useful herb we have been considering, in the law given to it, in common with the rest of the vegetable world, that each plant should produce its like in the consequent propagation of grass from the creation to the present time—in the universality of its growth-in its uses with respect to animals and men.

When we behold the inanimate creation, exactly and continually fulfilling the end appointed for it, we may entreat the forgiveness of God for having so long neglected to fulfil the great object of our existence: we may pray that during the short period of our earthly life, the end for which we came into it may be accomplished.

LEAF.

To which kingdom of nature does this belong? To what class of vegetables?

Of what kind of tree is it the leaf?

Are the leaves of all trees alike? The leaves of the same tree? Are they perfectly alike?

Let us take a leaf from different trees; from an oak, a lime, a birch, an ash, an elm, a poplar, and compare their forms.

Describe the form of each. Tell me in what the forms differ from each other :-the shades of colour-the texture-the disposition of the fibres.

Now let us look again at the leaf I first shewed you. Is it square? round? oval? triangular? heart-shaped? Is it regular or irregular?

Is it broader at one end than at the other? At which end is it broadest? Is this the case with every kind of leaf?

What do you observe at the edges of the leaf? What at the bottom of the leaf?

And what is the use of the stalk?

Enumerate all the parts of the tree between the leaf and the stem. Do you observe an order? Whose order?

How many intermediate parts did we mention?

And what intermediate parts may we trace,

between the stem of the tree and the least fibres of the root?

Of what may we be reminded in considering the connection between the fibres of the root, and the minutest fibre of the leaf?

[We may think of the parts of our own body, and the connection which subsists between them. We may also think of the various members of the different orders of society, of their connection with each other, and with the common source of their existence and happiness. Read what St. Paul says 1 Cor. xii. 14—21.]

Let us farther observe the leaf before us. Is its surface rough or smooth?

Is the leaf transparent? Dull or shining?

Is it alike on both sides? Is the colour the same on both sides?

What parts do you observe in the leaf?What passes through the middle of it?

Of what does this appear to be the continuation?

Can you observe any other fibres ?-Let us try to trace their directions a little. Are they connected? How?

Now hold up the leaf to the light: what do you perceive? Is there not a kind of net-work? Of what is this composed? And what are these minute parts? Can you trace their connection with each other? Is not your power of observation nearly lost amidst the multitude of these small veins, and their various intersections?

Of what use are they to the leaf?

Of what use are the arteries and veins in your body?

What circulates through your body? And what in the leaf?

Unless your body received nourishment, could the blood circulate in it? And whence is the sap which circulates in the leaf supplied?

We have observed the veins in the leaf, and considered the purpose they serve; do you know what more the leaf has? [The leaf contains an abundance of pores; through these it breathes, and receives moisture which refreshes the tree.*]

What is the use of the leaf to the tree?

And of what use are the leaves of the tree to man?

Would this single leaf be missed from the tree? But how would the tree be affected, if we were suddenly to strip it of all its leaves?

Is the tree ever deprived of its leaves without dying? When? And how is the approach of a change indicated?

Who has taught us to derive spiritual improvement from these appearances of nature? See Matt. xvi. 2,3; Mark xiii. 28, 29; Luke xiii. 6-9.

What is the time of the leaf?

*The Teacher may try to find a leaf in which the pores may be observed with the naked eye; (the Hypericum perforatum, for instance, has transparent glands or pores which are very visible,) or he may shew them the pores of different leaves through a microscope.

When did the leaf first appear ?

What causes it to fall from the tree?

Does no leaf fall from the tree before the winter? What reflection may this suggest? Do you remember the comparison, Isaiah lxiv. 6?

When the leaf falls, what becomes of it?
Does it lose its form as a leaf?

it at once?

Does it lose

What do we mean by its corrupting

[When we speak of a substance corrupting, we mean, that its parts are decomposed.]

The parts of the leaf then, are gradually decomposed, and it has been found that they are changed into a species of air (carbonic acid gas): this air is again absorbed by other vegetables-these in their turn corrupt, and undergo the same process.-A revolution is thus continually taking place in the parts of Creation.

We said that when the leaf corrupts, its form is lost but is the matter of the leaf lost?

No sort of matter is ever lost; it may undergo various changes, it may pass through different forms, but the essence still subsists.-The same God who created every particle of matter, con. tinues to uphold it through all its revolutions.*

*No power but that which created can destroy. Man may destroy the form, he may change the substance, but he cannot annihilate one single particle of matter. It is worthy of re. mark, that in what appears to us the most complete mode of destruction, that by fire, the substance is only changed from a grosser to one more refined.