of man consists in removing all obstacles, making all conditions harmonious, all work attractive, all relations agreeable and suitable. Following out this theory, we strive to break away from all inharmonious relations. But the poor Irish woman, who clings to her brutal, drunken husband, and says, "He was good, maʼam, once, and he's my husband," can teach these philosophers a lesson. I do not say that she is right, or that they are wrong; but I do say, that true human progress often consists rather in taking the good of our position, and bearing its evils, than in breaking away from inharmonious relations. The world advances through shadow as well as through sunshine. The heart grows great and noble by manfully meeting and bearing the great trials of life. When we are weak, then we are strong.

This nation of ours, amid all its prosperity, has had its thorn in the flesh. The institution of negro slavery in the United States has been the one thorn in our destiny, the one difficulty of our situation. All good men have sought for years, and prayed, that this thorn might be removed. We have tried to get rid of it by colonization, by emancipation, by debate, and all varied efforts, in vain. God has left this thorn in the flesh of the nation to sting it into humility, and reliance on him; and now it has humbled us indeed. It has destroyed for a time our Union, taken away our prosperity, involved the present in doubts and the future in darkness, and caused all Europe to shake its head at us in derision. But this humiliation

the country needed; and this thorn is allowed to remain, till we learn to lean on God and truth, on justice and humanity, not on our own strength, energy, wealth, and abundant power. Nothing else, perhaps, could have taken out of the national mind that egregious vanity and self-esteem which was growing more colossal every year. We seemed to suppose that it was our own energy and ability which had prepared for us the continent. We took credit to ourselves for the richness of our land, the extent of our soil, the treasures of minerals and vegetables which we possessed. We felt a little proud because our rivers were so long, and our States so large. As for our prosperity, we attributed it wholly to our own enterprise and talent. No wonder that the Old World listened to us with some disgust; and so now, in our trial, we do not obtain its whole sympathy. It might have had sympathy with our cause, if not with us. But better for us, perhaps, to learn to stand alone, and fight our own way back to union and peace.

"Leaves fall; but, lo, the young buds peep!
Flowers die; but still their seed shall bloom.
From death the quick young life will leap,
Now Spring has come to touch the tomb.
The splendid shiver of brave blood
Is thrilling through our country now;
And she, who in old times withstood
The tyrant, lifts again her brow.
God's precious charge we sternly keep
Unto the final victory :

With freedom we will live, or sleep
With our great dead who set us free.
God forget us, when we forget
To keep the old flag flying yet!"

VI.

IT

FAITHFUL OVER A FEW THINGS.

Matt. xxv. 21: "FAITHFUL OVER A FEW THINGS.

T is a peculiarity of Christianity to lay stress on little things. It cares more for quality than for quantity. One man "may bestow all his goods to feed the poor;" and yet the gospel shall pronounce him devoid of love to his neighbor, and of less account than the poor widow who puts her two mites into the treasury of God. It is not, "How much have you done?" but, "In what spirit have you acted?" not, "How long?" but, "How well?”

Every man's life has a law which governs it. All that he does unconsciously, he does according to that law. Is his ruling motive ambition, pleasure, conscience, love of truth, love of God? Then that ruling motive colors every act; and every word he utters in his most careless hours partakes of that general determination. And therefore for And therefore for every idle word shall he give an account, because his idle words. are all polarized by the central magnetism which governs his soul. In the English marine, it is said, there is a thread of scarlet which is woven into all

the cordage, from the largest cable to the smallest line. It is the mark of government property. So a line of red runs through all of our thoughts, words, feelings, and actions. It is the stamp of our character upon each one of them. So Shakspeare never introduces on the stage a character that is not qualified by an individuality. If he speaks a second time in the play, you may know that it is the same person who spoke before.

If there is such a law of unity pervading our lives, some of us are not very well aware of it. We think that we can act one way in small things, another way in great ones: that in small matters we are not under law, but that in great things we are. So we come to despise or to neglect small matters. We trifle with truth in little things, with honesty in little things, with the law of reverence or of love in little things.

But what is the meaning of the word "integrity"? It means thoroughness, entireness; putting the same quality of soul into every thing, great and small. No one is a man of integrity who does not do every thing with the same undeviating honesty, the same unbending principle. The man of real integrity puts the whole energy of conscience, faith, love, into the smallest act as into the greatest. So the steamengine in a factory exerts the same tremendous power to cut in two an iron bar, or to stick a pin into a card.

Christianity does not allow us to trifle with any thing. There is nothing trivial to the illuminated

eye and heart of faith. He who says to his brother, "Thou fool!" is in danger of hell-fire. He is, in fact, already in hell-fire; for the feeling of contempt for his brother, the scorn and disdain which can thus reject from its sympathy a fellow-man, is itself the spirit of the pit.

"He who hateth his brother," says the apostle, "is a murderer." His hate may vent itself in no deadly act, in no word of injury: but the hatred in the heart is murderous; it is tending that way. It is the arc of the curve, the return of which is deadly.

A similar error leads us often to say, "How much good I would do with my money, if I were as rich as this man or the other!” How much good do you do now with what you have? "Oh! if I had only time, what would I not learn and do!" says another. How do you spend the time you have? If you do not spend well the small time you have to spend, the little money you have to use, why do you think you would do better with more? The astronomer turns his glass to the heavens, and fixes three little points of the comet's course, and so finds a small arc of its curve. From that are he can predict. the whole. And so there may be an angel looking down this moment on you and me, seeing what we have done yesterday, the day before yesterday, and to-day; and, from these three positions of our soul, he may infer the path in which we are moving,— inward toward the sun of life and light, or outward into darkness, coldness, and death.