straining, how imperishable is the motive to Christian love here assigned! It springs from the basis of man's reconciliation with God. A sense of that love, on the part of God, which effected this reconciliation, makes the cultivation of charity a duty and a delight.

My object in tracing further this delineation of charity is to show its bearing upon our daily conduct, under the trials, and in the duties of life.

In entering upon this subject, I would revert briefly to the motive which is habitually to actuate our conduct as between man and man. That motive is love to man, arising from a sense of God's love to us, as manifested in His giving His Son to be a ransom for the sins of the whole world. The implantation of this motive justifies the wisdom, and power, and mercy of God. While this pervading principle discards not, as auxiliaries, motives of human reason and human policy, and natural amiableness and sensibility, it maintains a triumphant ascendancy over all, and animates its subjects to go forth among mankind, having learned "to love

enemies, to bless them that curse, to do good to them that hate, to pray for them that dispitefully use and persecute;" this proving the subjects of its influence to be "the children of our Father which is in heaven, who maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust," and hath taught us "to be kind one to another, tender hearted, forgiving one another, even as He, for Christ's sake, has forgiven us."

The strength of this motive, operating among mankind, is sufficient to uphold the spiritual building; it gives symmetry, and order, and grace to the living fabric; it secures equity, and kindness, and tenderness, in daily intercourse, by making the principle of our conduct towards others identical with that which we should wish to govern their conduct towards ourselves; it makes us "do unto others as we

would that they should do unto us."

Our attention shall now be directed to the first aspect under which charity is presented to us by the Apostle, in the chapter under review. "Though I speak with the tongues of men and

of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or as a tinkling cymbal; and though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing; and though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor; and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing."

The impression which these verses manifestly leave upon the mind is, that, in the judgment of God, the motive stamps the value of the action. Our conduct towards others may be influential, in varying degrees, for their permament benefit, while the motives which dictated that conduct may have been devoid of any genuine, much less any Christian desire for their eventual good. Self, individually—self, embodied as a party, may have pervaded the transaction. The supposition is awful, but it is possible-not improbable; nay, an actual reality. The prince of darkness may be "transformed into an angel of light," and while malig

nity and deception were the reigning motives, may subserve the cause of benevolence and truth. Take the case supposed by the Apostle. Gifts of tongues, indefinitely varied, force of argument, powers of persuasion, human and super-human, may convince the understanding, may attract and command the feelings of a captivated audience, may lead to a vital reception of Christianity; and the speaker himself may stand up, in the sight of God, a hollow exhibition, without any emotion of Christian love, speaking good words with his mouth, but in reality as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal! The interval is wide between the head and the heart.

Let the next exemplification set forth by the Apostle be considered.

"Though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing." The power of foretelling events, or of comparing the signs of the times with the revealed description of events surely to be

anticipated, or of "discerning spirits," and of discriminating between false and real teachers, or of expounding Scripture rightly, may be the gifted possession of a human being. Others may by him be correctly trained up to varying degrees of Scriptural knowledge. Feeling and experience may by them have been accumulated through prayer for the blessing of God upon his instrumentality. But how, in the estimation of God, stands the teacher himself? The supposition is, that he is without charity. He is instructed in the law; he is acquainted with the Gospel; he understands all mysteries, and all knowledge. The depths of redeeming love; the stores of Divine knowledge, as necessary for edification, are laid open to him. Faith, so that he could remove mountains, might miraculously be given to him. And faith as an instrument by which to appropriate the blessings of redemption to ourselves, might be a doctrine which the understanding receives. But supreme love to God, arising from a sense of God's love, in "not sparing His Son, but delivering Him up for us all," formed no