and propriety, and draw the line very clearly between the church and the world. There may be darkness resting upon some high hill, or some deep vale where you cannot discover the line of demarcation. But look up to him who is the Father of lights; He will scatter every cloud-in His light ye shall see light. Search for the line, for it separates between characters, interests and destinies that are totally unlike. On the one side are saints-on the other sinners. On the one side God-on the other mammon. On the one side heaven-on the other hell. As you therefore prize the soul, and its immortal well-being, strive to distinguish between the children of this world, and the children of God. II. As ye cannot serve God and Mammon, be careful and exert all your influence in favor of the service of God. This was one of the leading objects for which Christians were called with an effectual calling. They can meet the world at a thousand points and manifest sympathy, tenderness and love more than ever. They can be social, cheerful and obliging; and in all show that the joy of the Lord is their strength. They can sustain many intimate relations, and co-operate with the world in many duties; and yet there is an important sense in which they are to come out from the world and be separate. We are surely to have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. Neither are we to have fellowship in any of those amusements that serve to increase the stupidity and moral delirium of the world. There is a strong tide of levity, vanity and worldliness that is sweeping away all serious reflection, all fear of God, all concern for the soul, and all sense of eternal realities. Now let me ask you, my dear brethren, what is the danger to which religion is now most exposed? Is it asceticism--a retired, strict, over-scrupulous regard to christian duty? Is it not rather a neglect of those duties that distinguish the child of God, and a commingling with the world that is well nigh fatal to the spirit of piety? Is the church presenting an aspect of religion that is too serious and solemn and self-denying in view of the world? Are christians spending too much time in prayer-speaking too often one to another about the things of the kingdom, and beseeching sinners too frequently and too earnestly to become reconciled to God? Is this the excess of grace that marks the people of God at the present day? Is there not rather a flood of worldly feeling, rushing through the bosom of the church, and carrying away much that was fair and lovely? Are we not in great danger of being swallowed up of the world? I think I know how every fair and serious-minded christian. will answer these inquiries. Be careful, then, I entreat you, how you exert your influence. Launch_ not out upon the dangerous current, lest you glide downward. Let your example be all right. Let your light so shine before men, that they shall see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven. Do not approve, nor half endorse these things that intoxicate with worldly pleasure, and serve to deepen the slumbers of moral death. Throw around your brethren in the church-throw around all your fellow travellers to eternity those checks, and happy influences that will tend to restrain them from the pleasures of sin, and lead them to the practice of holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord. In your intercourse with the world, cases may arise in which there shall be doubt about the path of duty, or the extent to which you shall go. Such cases, oftentimes, may be settled by a few simple inquiries. What will be the probable effect on my own spirituality of mind? Might prayer and religious conversation be consistently and appropriately connected with such exercises? Will christians be improved, and sinners receive a favorable impression respecting their character and their religion; or will Christ be wounded in the house of his friends? If the mind is not relieved, and the path of duty made plain; let the service of God have the benefit of your doubts. Do not go forward in the dark. If you do, you will fall into condemnation and the snare of the devil. You will wound your conscience, harden your heart, and bring leanness into your soul. If your brethren are in doubt about the propriety of a given course, do not disregard their views and their feelings. Serious, praying, working, cross-bearing christians, very generally entertain such views with regard to certain amusements, as have been expressed by this church and published in their manual. They feel that it is wrong to engage in them. Now in such cases we are bound to regard the feelings and convictions of our brethren, save when our own minds are free from all difficulty. In the fourteenth chapter of Paul's Epistle to the Romans, you will find a principle that is applicable to all such cases. No one is at liberty to trifle with the conscientious scruples and serious convictions of his brethren in Christ. It is better to favor them, and be sure that all our influence is on the side of God, than to seek the friendship of the world by wounding the household of faith. III. The highest excellence of christian character is attained by complete subjection to the service of God. Most of those who are hopefully the friends of Christ, are frequently falling back into their former habits, that are inconsist ent with their holy profession. They are taken by surprise, if not willingly, by their easily besetting sins. This is not strange, considering the many years they were held in bondage, and led captive by Satan at his will. In that long period sin gained strong dominion, and now the principle of grace, if it exist at all, is comparatively feeble. But every one, just so far as he returns to the beggarly elements of the world-just so far as he becomes entangled again with the yoke of bondage, loses that sweet sense of liberty--that conscious independence and manliness of character that pertain to him when he walks closely with God, and is wholly devoted to his service. If he listens when the lust of the flesh cries for indulgence, and the lust of the eyes entices, and the pride of life lifts him up and urges him away after its vanities; if he yields to the tyranny of fashion, and conforms to the world in its foolish and hurtful customs, he loses the benignant smile of Heaven, and ceases to hear the peaceful whispers of his own conscience. He loses the enjoyment that religion is calculated to afford, and fails to find that satisfaction in the world which it is always promising-but in vain. Such an one is pained and vexed with the consciousness of being engaged in an impossible task-that of serving God and Mammon. He knows he can never do it. His reason, his conscience, his experience and observation all assure him this united service is an impossibility. And yet, the heart is so weak and deceitful, and the temptations of the world so numerous and powerful that multitudes are ever attempting this very thing. So doing, their happiness and usefulness are diminished, and their character suffers. But let a man assert and maintain his liberty by the strength and grace of God. Let him gain the mastery over himself, so that the law in his members which was against the law of his mind, is held in subjection, so that his former sinful habits are subdued his whole body and spirit are brought into the obedience of Christ, and he stands up a freeman of the Lord. Mammon, whom he once served, is now renounced; and God is exalted to the throne. His will is the rule, and his glory is the end of the christian's life in all things. Contemplate such a character as set forth in the history of the Apostle Paul. How lovely, how admirable, how transcendently excellent! It exhibits man in the true dignity of his nature--but a little lower than the Angels! To such an one we may apply the stanzas of Cowper: "A kingly character he bears; No change his priestly office knows; "The noblest creature seen below, To such a character, dear brethren, let us all aspire; and endeavor to attain it by entire consecration to the service and glory of God. And you who are the willing servants of Mammon; let me entreat you to change masters. In your present service you can never experience that peace, joy, liberty and elevation for which you were made. Mammon will treat you as slaves,-subject you to hard, unrequited toil while you live, and bequeath to you nothing but an inheritance of wo when you die. Escape from the house of bondage, and come to the land of the free. Break the yoke of sin, and take the yoke of Christ. You will find it easy, and the burden light. You shall have the liberty of the sons of God now, and their glorious kingdom hereafter. HYMN. Be thou, O Lord, my treasure here, The world how mean, with all its store, Its vain and fleeting joys how few! The goods of earth are empty things, And pleasures soon decay; Its honors are but noisy breath, And sceptres pass away. Ye vain and glittering toys, begone; Ye false delights, adieu! My glorious Lord fills all the space, And leaves no room for you. -BEDDOME. THE LOVE OF HOME-ITS INFLUENCE ON RELIGION AND CHARACTER.* "Wouldst thou be spoken for to the king, or to the captain of the host? And she answered, I dwell among mine own people."-2 KINGS iv. 13. THERE is a sweet and touching simplicity in the answer of the woman of Shunem to the question of Elisha, "Wouldst thou be spoken for to the king or the captain of the host? And she answered, I dwell among mine own people." This reply evinced a mind unsophisticated in the ways of the world; without ambition in respect to its honors and distinctions; averse to change; and which found in the common and every-day duties of life, and in its own social and domestic circle, ample scope not only for the exercise of its sympathies and its charities, and the kindly play of those affections which are essential to the formation of virtuous character, but also the highest degree of human happiness. There is great force in the proverb, "Home is home, though ever so homely. It is founded on the great law of Divine Providence, which instituted the domestic institution, divided the race into families, and implanted in the human bosom the love of home, of kindred, and of country. Nor is there any thing more pernicious and mischievous than that cosmopolitan philanthropy, which pretending to embrace the world in its affections, contemns this providential arrangement, and would obliterate all ties of kindred, all local attachments which bind us to the place of our * Preached before the General Association of New Hampshire. |