incitement is there not, then, in a course of steadfast and high devotion to duty, in the abiding sense that the favor and blessing of God will attend such a life? If those thus actuated fail in receiving all the blessings of this world which men so eagerly seek, they do not lose their reward. While the heart is maintained in its integrity, and strives ever to think and do right, as the follower of Him who has promised to men their eternal salvation, the greatest and best ends of life are secured, and the Christian has peace of mind and the favor of his God, and before him is the glorious recompense of the heavenly world. Whatever may be the disappointments and trials which may attend man on earth, he has his reward, -a reward with which nothing temporal can be compared. Let this, then, sustain and animate the righteous in their earthly pilgrimage. Let no temptation or trial draw them away from the narrow path of life. "Keep innocency, and take heed unto the thing that is right; for that shall bring a man peace at the last."

XVIII.

SECRET SINS.

"Who can understand his errors? Cleanse thou me from secret faults."-PSALM xix. 12.

THE Psalmist had been engaged in contemplating the purity and perfection of the Law of God, and in applying it to the great purpose for which it was given, the trial of the character. His emotions find expression in a general confession of his own sinfulness, and yet with a deep conviction of his ignorance of its extent. The majesty and perfection of the Law fill his soul with an overwhelming sense of his transgressions, and at the same time awaken a fear lest he should remain blind to the depth of his guilt. The experience of every penitent man must be the same. more deeply he is impressed with the holiness of God, and the spotless purity of His law, the stronger will his conviction become that he is a miserable sinner in His sight. But he will also be conscious how little he knows himself, how far he is from having a full, practical knowledge of his sins, and how entirely he must throw himself upon the mercy of a holy God.

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Indeed, no man can contemplate the Law of God without knowing that, judged by its standard, he has fallen far short of his duty. But to convert this knowledge into practical emotion, to feel and act upon this conviction, is more difficult. At its best estate human nature is blind, and if we could not trust that a general confession would be accepted of God, we should remain forever in a hopeless condition. The greatest number of our transgressions, the great body of sin, we probably never realize. How appropriate are the words of the Psalmist,-"Who can understand his errors? Cleanse thou me from secret faults." By "secret faults" is meant faults or sins concealed from the view of him who is guilty; and in proceeding with my subject, I wish to show how it happens that men live thus blinded, to so great a degree, to their own guilt.

1. Among the reasons, I would place, first, the extreme difficulty attending even the attempt at self-knowledge. The ancient oracle pronounced it the highest wisdom to know one's self, and, like all wisdom, the path to this is beset with obstacles. The most difficult of all duties is that of self-examination, -the humble, patient, unshrinking search into the secret recesses of the human soul. Hardly anything eludes the observation of man so easily as the world within. Stationed in the midst of the universe of God, there seems no bound to the range of bold and exact inquiry in the outward world. Nothing so distant, nothing so concealed,

nothing so intangible and evanescent, as to daunt the attempt to discover its laws, or bring it to light, or analyze its properties. Human genius ranges with a familiar step amidst the unseen worlds suspended in boundless space, and with a prophet's ken predicts therein movements for ages. to come; or, turning its view within this globe of earth, makes known with unerring science its interior structure, and from its crumbling remains constructs the history of its condition and inhabitants in ages long past before the annals of the present race. It binds to its service the most subtile elements, the most impalpable fluids, the most ethereal influences, which are perceptible to no sense, until drawn out from their invisible state by the hand of science, she adapts them to the purposes of human improvement, comfort, and happiness. She makes out of them her swiftest messengers, flying with equal ease through solid rock and liquid air; she converts them, as it were, into moral and intelligent powers, to do the work of the human mind.

Thus has man advanced in the knowledge of the outward world. But where is the evidence of similar progress in exploring the world within the soul? Is this region known better than it was ages ago? Can we advance in it, step by step, as in natural science, any more easily than in former generations? Have we any better or surer guides, more correct maps, more expeditious or easy modes of proceeding? No, in questions of this sort men do not pretend to be a whit wiser than

their fathers. The latter knew themselves, and knew how to examine their own consciences and hearts, as thoroughly as the men of this day. And it may well be doubted if any aids to reflection, to self-knowledge, to observation of the interior life of the soul, are better than those which come to us from the very midst of those dark ages, when science hardly had being, from such saints as à Kempis, or Bernard; or, to descend to later times, from Taylor, or Leighton, or Fénelon, two centuries ago. The truth is, in this matter of selfexamination every man stands more alone than in other parts of knowledge, and such is the infinite variety of human life, circumstances, condition, and character, that all moral rules, however certain in the abstract, require in the application practical moral wisdom. The grand means for self-examination we all have in the Word of God, - the standard, the guide, the treasury of example, — exhibiting good and evil in manifold phases. But the application of these is difficult, and no man can here lean much on another. The work must be personal and independent, and most difficult. The rule of right and wrong is one, — unvarying and unchangeable, but how many complex considerations mingle together in its right application? How many things unite to make up the motive of a single act? Examine your life for a day, and ask what has been its governing motive? How much selfishness, pride, mere taste, love of the world, passion, or prejudice, deflect from a right