society, in its various and extended combinations, will be taken from the religious system under which it is moulded, and to which it appeals, at once as the test of its character, and as the directory of its conduct. Those who affect to think that it is of small importance to what religious system a man gives his assent, and in what way he worships God, so that he worship him at all—that all incense is alike before the Deity, whether presented

"By saint, by savage, or by sage;"

and to whomsoever presented

1

"Jehovah, Jove, or Lord :"

forget that human actions are determined by motives; and that our very motives are themselves controlled by our religious convictions: in short, that where religion is any thing more than profession, where it is principle at all, it is a principle allpowerful, under all circumstances influential, and that it acts with a force alike inconceivable, and uncontrollable.

BENEVOLENCE OF CHRISTIANITY.

THE character of the whole Christian system is a character of benevolence. In the life of its author, in the labours of his apostles, in the nature of his precepts, in the spirit of his religion-there is but one principle running through the whole

benevolence. It is one of the most delightful representations of the Divine character, and it is peculiar to revealed religion, that God is disposed to comfort and to encourage those whom man despises and abandons. In the refined speculations of philosophy, magnificent attributes encircled the God of Nature, where reason could be prevailed upon to purify itself in some degree from the grossness of a corrupt imagination, yet in those rare instances, the perfections conceived were interwoven with terrors that chastened love: but when the gospel declared him as he really is, he was manifested clothed in tenderness that corrects and subdues fear. The God of man's conception was attracted by the external circumstances of pomp and talent: he was partial in his regards, both of persons and of places; he was the God of the hero, of the noble, of the philosopher-the God of nature and of revelation sends his rain alike "upon the evil and upon the good-causes his sun to shine upon the just, and upon the unjust "-distributes with true paternal feeling and affection equal smiles upon every country, and people, and rank,upon the poor and the rich-upon the learned and the illiterate upon the European and the African

and he "is no respecter of persons." In examiuing the testimony of this volume, we see throughout, (and experience confirms the fact asserted in the Bible,) that if a preference is shown at all, it is favourable to those who are of little value in human estimation. If there be one ray brighter than

another from the same sun, it falls upon the cottage rather than upon the palace. Thus a counterbalance to affliction is afforded the wounded mind. He who

"Rides on a cloud disdainful by

A sultan or a czar,

Laughs at the worms that rise so high,

Or frowns them from afar;"

sees some of the children of disease and poverty suffering his will, who could not by active service perform it, and looks approbation that finds its way to their heart. He calls the friendless being, from whom the world avert their eyes with disgust or with scorn-his friend, his brother, his child. "Thus saith the High and Lofty One who inhabiteth eternity; I dwell in the high and holy place— with him also who is of a broken spirit, and who trembleth at my word." Such are the declarations of revelation, and they are sanctioned by Providence. Were it not going too far from the subject, several reasons might be assigned for the advantage of the poor over the rich. The great often enjoy less of the divine notice than the lowly, because it is the tendency of their situation to allure their desirés from that direction: "they will not come unto him that they might have life"-he also abases the proud, while he elevates the humble, that "no flesh should glory in his presence"-he measures his distributions according to the necessities of every man: and if he particularly directs his attention

his kindness, and his care to the poor, it is because they need it more. But waving this, as it is not our immediate object to vindicate "eternal providence, and justify the ways of God to man," it is evident not merely that a benevolent attention is paid to every class of human life-most to those who need it most-but that the leading, the peculiar, the constant feature of Christianity, is benevo lence.

MIRACLES OF CHRIST

THEY had all a tendency to alleviate human affliction, and to diminish those calamities which imbitter or shorten life. Hunger devours the man, and is one of the most frightful evils attendant upon poverty. But he who refused to work a miracle to feed himself, when he saw that the multitude had nothing to eat, and that they fainted, had compassion on them, and supplied them. He who yearly multiplies the grain, by an act of the same power multiplied five loaves and two fishes to satisfy five thousand. Worse than even hunger is it to have disease in the frame. And how multiform are the miseries of human life!, Yonder stands one, waiting for a hand to guide him. The eye is extinguished; and while day smiles on the face of nature, night gathers forever round his head. There is another, whose ear never drank in a stream of melody-the organ is closed against strains which steal through that avenue into the

heart of his neighbour-he "never heard the sweet music of speech"-nor perceives the tones of his own unformed, untuned, unmodulated voice. Here is a third, who appears before me, without the power of utterance-the string of the tongue was never loosed, and he never spake: the organs of speech are deranged, or were never perfectly formed-he hears tones which vibrate on his heart —but he cannot impart through the same medium the same pleasurable sensation. These could not escape the compassionate eye of Jesus. He gave sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, speech to the dumb, limbs to the maimed, health to the sick, strength to decrepitude. But yonder is the chamber of death. Darker is the cloud that broods there. Where the tongue was silent the eye was eloquent when the palsied limb refused to move -the ear heard and discriminated sounds which melt the passions, and stir the spirit within us: it was sad to tend the couch of sickness,-but still we seemed to have some hold upon the sufferer, and he to have some interest in life. But that is the bed of mortality, and the young, the beautiful, the only hope of her family is stretched there— and there is Jesus also-rousing her from death as from a gentle slumber, and restoring her to the arms of her parents. There is yet one other class of suffering worse than death. It glares in the eye, it raves in the voice, it struggles in the limbs of that man, whose throne of reason, imagination has usurped, and over the whole empire of his