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in equity and good conscience. The answer to this question may often be a very afflicting one; but if men will do amiss, they must take the consequences. It may also, in some cases, be difficult to fix upon the right answer, or to find proper methods of putting it in practice, if we know it; but we must not, on account of difficulties, lay aside the thought of doing our duty, but ask the best advice where we are at a loss, leave directions to be executed by others, where we have not time ourselves; and at least make due acknowledgments, unless particular circumstances forbid, where we cannot make amends. Perhaps nothing further than acknowledgments will be expected by those whom we have injured; and then we are bound to nothing further.

But as we have all more or less need to ask pardon, another of our duties evidently is, to grant it in our turn: when others have used us ill, not to recompense or wish them evil for evil; not to deny them proper kindnesses; or even think of them worse than they deserve to accept any submissions that do but approach towards being sufficient, and be reconciled to them, not in words alone, which is adding hypocrisy to resentment, but in reality, affording them as large proofs, both of our favour and confidence, as any good and wise man, uninterested in the matter, would think fitting-seriously wishing their good, in soul, body, and estate, and being ready to promote it as far as we properly can. This is the full meaning of being in charity, which we ought to be constantly in with all men; and, if the reason of our professing to be so is merely that we imagine our end to be near, it will be extremely questionable whether we are so indeed. Yet, a late, nay, an imperfect reconciliation is always preferable to none, provided there be any sincerity in it. For the expedient, to which, it is said, some have had recourse, of forgiving if they die, and being revenged if they live, is as wicked and as foolish a contrivance to deceive themselves, and to mock God, as the human heart can frame.

LAURENCE STERNE.

"The Sermons of Mr Yorick" are chiefly remarkable for their curious commencements. On the text, "But Abishai said, Shall not Shimei be put to death for this?" he begins, "It has not a good aspect. This is the second time Abishai has proposed Shimei's destruction." Again, the text is, "And he said, What have they seen in thine house? And Hezekiah answered, All the things that are in my house they have seen; there is nothing amongst all my treasures that I have not shewn them;" and the sermon commences, "And where was the harm, you'll say, in all this?" Once more, from the text, "He hoped also that money should have been given him of Paul, that he might loose him," he sets out, "A noble object to take up the consideration of the Roman governor! And was this Felix-the great, the noble Felix ?" &c. After giving out the text, "It is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting," he exclaims, "That I deny !"*

But

Few things shew more strikingly the low tone of moral feeling in England about the middle of last century, than the enthusiasm with which books were received so profligate and unprincipled as "Tristram Shandy" and the "Sentimental Journey;" and it seems almost a satire on religion, that a pen so foul should have been employed in writing sermons. so it was; and these last were almost as popular as his other lucubrations. They abound in similar buffooneries and whimsicalities, and for their want of heart and genuine worth they try to compensate by a profusion of maudlin sentiment. It is not without some hesitation that we admit into our series names like Sterne and Dodd; but our sketch of pulpit oratory would be very incomplete if we made no mention of men so dazzling On the subject of exordiums to sermons, see "Christian Classics," vol. iii., pp. 27-30.

in their day. The first two volumes of " Mr Yorick's Sermons" were published in 1760. Our copy is dated 1767, and is of the eighth edition.

Laurence Sterne was born at Clonmel, in Ireland, November 24, 1713. His father was a lieutenant in the army, and his uncle, Dr Jaques Sterne, was a prebendary of Durham. To this relation he was indebted for the living of Sutton, where he spent twenty years of his clerical career, "painting, fiddling, and shooting." He died during a visit to London, March 18, 1768.

The following is a favourable specimen of discourses which were so admired in the days of our great-grandsires; but all their galvanic attempts at emotion will hardly reconcile the modern reader to the liberties taken with the matchless story of

The Prodigal Son.

He gathers all together.

I see the picture of his departure; the camels and asses loaden with his substance, detached on one side of the piece, and already on their way; the prodigal son standing on the foreground, with a forced sedateness, struggling against the fluttering movement of joy upon his deliverance from restraint; the elder brother holding his hand, as if unwilling to let it go; the father-sad moment!-with a firm look, covering a prophetic sentiment, "that all would not go well with his child," approaching to embrace him, and bid him adieu. Poor inconsiderate youth! From whose arms art thou flying? from what a shelter art thou going forth into the storm? Art thou weary of a father's affection, of a father's care? or hopest thou to find a warmer interest, a truer counsellor, or a kinder friend in a land of strangers, where youth is made a prey, and so many thousands are confederated to deceive them, and live by their spoils?

We will seek no further than this idea for the extravagancies by which the prodigal son added one unhappy example to the number. His fortune wasted-the followers of it fled in course—the wants of nature remain-the hand of God gone forth against him. "For when he had spent all, a mighty famine arose in that country." Heaven have pity upon the youth, for he is in hunger and distress; strayed out of the reach of a parent who counts every hour of his absence with anguish; cut off from all his tender offices by his folly, and from relief and charity from others by the calamity of the times.

Nothing so powerfully calls home the mind as distress. The tense fibre then relaxes-the soul retires to itself—sits pensive and susceptible of right impressions. If we have a friend, it is then we think of him; if a benefactor, at that moment all his kindnesses press upon our mind. Gracious and bountiful God! is it not for this that they who in their prosperity forget Thee, do yet remember and return to Thee in the hour of their sorrow? When our heart is in heaviness, upon whom can we think but Thee, who knowest our necessities afar off-puttest all our tears in Thy bottle-seest every careful thought-hearest every sigh and melancholy groan we utter?

Strange, that we should only begin to think of God with comfort, when with joy and comfort we can think of nothing else.

Man surely is a compound of riddles and contradictions. By the law of his nature he avoids pain, and yet, unless he suffers in the flesh, he will not cease from sin, though it is sure to bring pain and misery upon his head for ever.

Whilst all went pleasurably on with the prodigal, we hear not one word concerning his father-no pang of remorse for the sufferings in which he had left him, or resolution of returning to make up the account of his folly. His first hour of distress seemed to be his first hour of wisdom. "When he

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came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father have bread enough and to spare, whilst I perish!"

Of all the terrors of nature, that of one day or another dying by hunger is the greatest; and it is wisely wove into our frame to awaken man to industry, and call forth his talents. And though we seem to go on carelessly, sporting with it as we do with other terrors, yet, he that sees this enemy fairly, and in his most frightful shape, will need no long remonstrance to make him turn out of the way to avoid him.

It was the case of the prodigal. father.

He arose to go to his

Alas! how shall he tell his story? Ye who have trod this round, tell me in what words he shall give in to his father the sad items of his extravagance and folly.

The feasts and banquets which he gave to whole cities in the east-the costs of Asiatic rarities, and of Asiatic cooks to dress them-the expenses of singing men and singing women -the flute, the harp, the sackbut, and of all kinds of musicthe dress of the Persian courts, how magnificent! their slaves, how numerous!—their chariots, their horses, their palaces, their furniture, what immense sums they had devoured! what expectations from strangers of condition! what exactions!

How shall the youth make his father comprehend that he was cheated at Damascus by one of the best men in the world; that he had lent a part of his substance to a friend at Nineveh, who had fled off with it to the Ganges; that he had been sold by a man of honour for twenty shekels of silver to a worker in graven images; that the images he had purchased had profited him nothing; that they could not be transported across the wilderness, and had been burnt with fire at Shushan; that the apes and peacocks,* which he had sent for from Tarshish, lay dead upon his hands; and that the mummies had not been dead long enough which had been brought him out of Egypt; Vide 2 Chron. ix. 21.