is at once the supreme source and perfect model; and in the exercise and exaltation of which we become more and more approximated to his eternal intelligence. This is, indeed, a glorious "end to all other ends;" and how, when we meditate upon it, can we forbear recollecting those expressive words

"Lord, what is man that Thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that Thou so regardest him?"

Would we but allow ourselves to think dispassionately, it must appear as natural as delightful, to yield to the desire of elevating our minds to Him" in whom we live, and move, and have our being;" by exercising our thoughts and improving our faculties, by meditating on his perfections and his love, and the indispensable obligations it imposes upon us to study his will, and to perform it. It is then, and then only, that study becomes truly interesting, and that the progress of knowledge is accompanied by an increase of happiness. How languishing

the sentiments, how fictitious the reasons, how cold the persuasions, and how unsatisfactory the end, which the Infidel finds in his studies, compared with those of the Christian, and the grand end to which he looks; here all is lively in exercise, reasonable in reflection, and true in the end. But it is not only to those whose minds like your's, my Albert, are improved by education and observation, and whose light bark has as yet encountered no storm on the ocean of life, upon whom Religion bestows her peace-giving favours; on the contrary, to those whose minds have never received human culture, and whose path has uniformly been rough and barren of all human good; who are devoid of property, and destitute of resource but by unceasing labour; it is to those that Religion presents her most enchanting views,-for she assures them, that their day of labour and sorrow is but short, and that reward is certain.

Religion teaches them to reconcile every

seeming disproportion of this world, by the simple but most comprehensive idea-"It is the Will of God;" of that God, who they believe watches continually over their lot. Many, indeed, are the popular expressions which might be cited, proving that Religion recalls continually, to the minds of it's poor disciples, the sweetest sentiments of consolation and unreserved confidence, in the parental government of their Creator.

What sustaining thoughts the idea of an omnipresent Deity inspire in the poor, borne down by the contempt of the world, I have been able most amply to observe, in the large, populous, but most necessitous village in which I passed my childhood; there I have seen it's invigorating power displayed in a thousand affecting instances, which impressed my memory, and sunk deep into my young heart,-leading me, even in the first dawn of my reason, to compare it (forgive the repetition of the figure)

H

to the sun, who in the distribution of his rays observes neither rank nor fortune. Thus have I often repeated to myself, when returning from a scene of deep calamity and poverty, rendered comparatively light by the hopes of Religion,— thus do we behold the comfort of those sentiments connected with the belief of a God and a Saviour, and the hopes in union with it, become like thy animating beams, thou sun! the property of all ranks, of all conditions!

In society there must necessarily be inequality of condition and possession; but Religion has the unfailing power to sweeten the hard disproportion, and to point out it's fitness.

Where then is the boasted compassion of the restless Infidel, when he seeks to remove the only prop of the wretched? who would tell them, when oppression bids the bitter tear to flow, there is no God to note them! who, when the suppliant knee is bended, in confidence of

relief, or of imparted strength to bear, would mock them with the taunt, that their confidence is in vain, there is no God to listen! who, when they raise their eyes to heaven, tell them that hope is illusion, their heaven an imagined one, and that there is no world beyond this of grief, of poverty, of disappointment, of death!

Will not the blankness of despair in this case stifle even the heavy groan, and the self-avenging arm be raised, were it not for the horrid and repugnant idea of annihilation, and yet a vague hope that somewhere there may be found commiseration, which will dry the tear and listen to the sigh?

Let us reverse the picture: -enter with me, ye cruel men, that lowly cottage, exposed to all the winds of heaven, and where poverty, age, and sickness scarcely find shelter from the pitiless storm. Once surrounded by many a vigorous and blooming branch, the now wi