ing and praise to its Creator. Delightful are the emotions of those who, harassed with terres trial cares, or satiated with the empty gratifications of life, refresh their fainting spirits with the weekly pleasures of religion. How contemptible are all the pursuits of a world which passeth away as a shadow, compared with the enraptured employment of worshipping the Lord of lords? With conscious satisfaction thence arising, the exulting hope is kindled that, by such preparation, the soul is fitting itself for the enjoyment of a blessed immortality. All earthly joys fade away in comparison of the sacred transports of a soul in communion with God. The fellowship of kin, dred spirits in the same duties gives a warmer glow to piety, and awakens in the heart whatever is animated in devotion, whatever is social and divine. No less delightful is the retirement allotted to the private exercises of religion; in the fervency of secret prayer the soul ascends to the throne of Grace, and, in meditating on the truths of Revelation, the mind is elevated with themes calculated to excite astonishment by their grandeur, and love by their overflowing kindness. The requirements of the sabbatical service, so far from being austere and forbidding, are fitted to produce all that is pleasant and peaceful, all that is ennobling, all that raises our intellectual nature to a purer enjoyment than this world affords. Un

reasonable, then, is it to murmur at the sabbath as an abridgment of human felicity, or to complain at the want of amusement amid such a profusion of pleasures the most sacred. Pitiable are those hearts which feel no conscious gratification at the Lord's festival, which spend it in weariness and distaste, which take no delight in duties so well adapted to exalt and exhilarate. The faithful and sincere hail its return as the season of their happiest hours; with the sweet Psalmist of Israel they are glad at the invitation "to go into the house of the Lord";" and in the hallowed moments of sacred joy, the worshipper exclaims, "Lord, how love I thy law: a day in thy courts is better than a thousand. I had rather be a door-keeper in the house of my God, than to dwell in the tents of ungodliness."

To those who have a just sense of the value of religion, and whose affections are centered, where they ought, upon things heavenly and eternal, the whole service of the Lord's day administers the most refined enjoyment, in addition to which there are recreations in abundance which may be harmlessly and lawfully enjoyed. All diversions, indeed, are not admissible, and I have attempted to draw the line of distinction according to the spirit and declarations of scripture. But far be

Psalm cxxii. 1.

* Ibid. cxix. 97-lxxxiv. 10.

it from any minister of the gospel to lord it, in this matter, over the consciences of men. It is a subject which may well admit some difference of opinion. Even while agreed in the general principles, some diversity may exist in their application to individual instances. Such minor differences have ever been, and ever will be, and should therefore be mutually forgiven, in pity to the weakness of our common nature. They ought to be merged in the unceasing ardour to preserve the fundamentals of our faith, without being suffered to violate the bond of peace, in the search of unattainable unity. Little is the justice, and less the charity of that man, who severely censures another for matters, in respect to which God has given no explicit directions. "Let us not, therefore, judge one another any more; but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling-block, or an occasion to fall, in his brother's way." So long as there is nothing in the conduct of a brother flagrantly contrary to the Word of God, though he may be weak in the faith, yet we ought to receive him, "but not to doubtful disputations." We may be truly charged with being angry with him without a cause, if we are offended merely because we cannot consent to join him

a Rom. xiv. 13. Compare ver. 4, 10. James iv. 11, 12. • Rom. xiv. 1.

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in certain recreations on the Lord's day. rity suffereth long, and is kind'; it rejects all harsh judgment; at the same time we are to mark and avoid those who cause divisions and offences contrary to sound doctrine; and, as we value the welfare of our souls, as we prize the glory of God, and the honour of his name, we must fly from all who evidently act from impure motives, and who, in the hour of relaxation and amusement, are guided by a spirit of profaneness and impiety.

Little is the stern and unrelenting disposition to be commended, which severely censures those ranks of society who gain subsistence by their daily toil, if they devote a larger portion of the day to recreation, than those who, in the world's estimation, are accounted their more fortunate brethren. The sabbath was intended to be in part a day of refreshment to the industrious classes, which it cannot be, if made a day of puritanical rigour and mortified restraint. Those who are engaged in wearisome and unwholesome occupations, may well be excused if they take advantage of the leisure afforded them to refresh their strength and spirits by innocent amusements; and those who are confined to the noxious atmosphere of populous cities, are not to be rudely

1 Cor. xiii. 4.

Rom. xvi. 17.

condemned, if, issuing forth "among the pleasant villages and farms," they recruit their harassed natures with rural pleasures, and a purer air. Provided they avoid all intemperance and riot, and tumultuous mirth, and suffer not recreation to interfere with the duties of the day, nor to disturb that sobriety of mind which it was intended to preserve, they cannot be culpable in accepting the offered boon of harmless pleasure. Sunday cannot be wholly passed in the devout offices of the church and the closet, nor would it accord with its destination to render it, by unne cessary austerity, dismal and forbidding. While therefore, we earnestly contend for the fulfilment both of the public and private duties of religion, let us not forbid what Providence has allowed to all, according to their respective ranks and avocations-seasonable intermissions for rational in

dulgence.