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PULPIT ELOQUENCE.

The Christian Church purer in Ancient than in
Modern times.

MASSILLON, after speaking of the purity of the church in ancient times, thus proceeds:-" But since that time, the faith growing weaker in beginning to extend itself, the number of the just diminishing in proportion as that of the faithful increased, the progress of the gospel has, it seems, stopped the progress of piety, and the whole world, become christian, has carried, in fine, with it into the church its corruption and its maxims. Alas! we go astray almost all of us from the breast of our mothers: the first use which we make of our heart is a crime. Our first propensities are passions; and our reason does not expand itself and grow, but upon the wreck of our innocence. The earth, says the prophet, is infected by the corruption of those who inhabit it. All have violated the laws, changed the ordinances, broken the alliance which should endure for ever: all work iniquity; and scarcely is there a single person to be found who does good. Injustice, calumny, falsehood, perfidy, adultery, crimes of the blackest complexion, have deluged the earth. Mendacium, et furtum, et adulterium, inundaverunt. The brother lays snares for the brother; the father is divided from his children; the husband from his wife. There is no tie which some vile interest does not divide. Good faith is no longer the virtue of any but the simple; hatreds are eternal; reconciliations are pretences; and never

do we look upon an enemy as a brother. We tear, we devour one another. Meetings are no more than scenes of public censure; the most pure virtue is no longer sheltered from the contradiction of tongues. Games have become traffic, or fraud, or madness. Repasts, those innocent ties of society, have degenerated into the most criminal excesses; public pleasures, into schools of incontinency. Our age witnesseth horrors unknown to our forefathers. The city is a sinful Nineveh; the court is the centre of all human passions; and virtue, authorised by the example of the Sovereign, honoured by his kindness, animated by his beneficence, renders vice there more circumspect, but does not render it, perhaps, more rare. All ranks, all conditions, have corrupted their ways. The poor murmur against the hand which chastises them: the rich forget the author of their abundance alone; the great seem born for themselves, and licentiousness appears to be the sole privilege of their elevation. The salt itself of the earth has become nauseous; the lamps of Jacob have extinguished themselves; the pillars of the sanctuary shamefully drag themselves into the dirt of public places, and the priest has become like to the people. O God! is this, then, your church, and the assembly of saints? Is this the inheritance so cherished, the beloved vine, the object of your care and of your tenderness ?-What Jerusalem offered most criminal to your eye, when you struck her with an eternal malediction?

What a

All this is excellent, particularly the manner of introducing the subject-Alas! we go astray almost all of us. knowledge of human nature!

On the Termination of a course of Dissipation.

WE speak not at present of the coming death and of the coming judgment, but of the change which

takes place on many a votary of licentiousness, when be becomes what the world calls a reformed man ; and puts on the decencies of a sober and domestic establishment, and bids adieu to the pursuits and the profligacies of youth; not because he has repented of them, but because he has outlived them. You all perceive how this may be done without one movement of the heart, or of the understanding, towards God-that it is done by many, though duty to him be not in all their thoughts-that the change, in this case, is not from the idol of pleasure unto God, but only from one idol to another-and that, after the whole of this boasted transformation, we may still behold the same body of sin and of death, but only a new complexion thrown over it. There may be the putting on of godliness. It is a common and an easy transition to pass from one kind of disobedience to another, but it is not so easy to give up that rebelliousness of the heart which lies at the root of all disobedience. It may be easy, after the wonted course of dissipation is ended, to hold out another aspect altogether in the eye of acquaintances; but it is not so easy to recover that shock, and that overthrow, which the religious principle sustains, when a man first enters the world, and surrenders himself to the power of its enticements. Such were some of you, says the Apostle, but ye are washed, and sanctified, and justified. Our reformed man knows not the meaning of such a process; and, most assuredly, he has not at all realized it in the history of his own person. We will not say what new object he is running after. It may be wealth, or ambition, or philosophy; but it is nothing connected with the interest of his soul. It bears no reference whatever to the concerns of that great relationship which obtains between the creature and the Creator. The man has withdrawn, and perhaps for ever, from the scenes of dissipation, and has betaken himself to another way-but still it is his own way, It is not the will or the way of God that he is yet caring for. Such a man may bid adieu to profligacy in his own person; but he lifts up the light of his countenance on the profligacy of others. He

gives it the whole weight and authority of his connivance. He wields, we will say it, such an instrumentality of seduction over the young, as, though not so alarming, is far more dangerous than the undisguised attempts of those who are the immediate agents of corruption. The formal and deliberate conspiracy of those who club together, at stated terms of companionship, may be all seen, and watched, and guarded against. But how shall we pursue this conspiracy into its other ramifications? How shall we be able to neutralize that insinuating poison which distils from the lips of grave and respectable citizens? How shall we be able to dissipate that gloss which is thrown, by the smile of elders and superiors, over the sins of forbidden indulgence? How can we disarm the bewitching sophistry which lies in all these tokens of complacency, on the part of advanced and reputable men? How is it possible to trace the progress of this sore evil, throughout all the business and intercourse of society? How can we stem the influence of evil communications, when the friend and the patron, and the man who has cheered and signalized us by his polite invitations, turns his own family-table into a nursery of licentiousness? How can we but despair of ever witnessing on earth a pure and a holy generation, when even parents will utter their polluting levities in the hearing of their own children; and vice, and humour, and gaiety, are all indiscriminately blended into one conversation; and a loud laugh from the initiated and the untainted in profligacy, is ever ready to flatter and to regale the man who can thus prostitute his powers of entertainment? O! for an arm of strength to demolish this firm and far-spread compact of iniquity; and for the power of some such piercing and prophetic voice, as might convince our reformed men of the baleful influence they cast behind them on the morals of the succeeding generation.

Chalmers.

In Dr. Chalmers, there may be seen much attention to the state of the christian world around him. Of this, our extracts afford

ample proof. No want of originality, or of his characteristic energy and eloquence.

The Influence of Idolatry over the Nations of the
Earth.

Not only is intellect everywhere under the dominion of idolatry, prostrated; but beyond the boundaries. of Christendom, on every side, the dark places of the earth are filled with the habitations of cruelty. We have mourned over the savage ferocity of the Indians of our western wilderness. We have turned to Africa, and seen almost the whole continent a prey to lawless banditti, or else bowing down in the most revolting idolatry. We have descended along her coast, and beheld villages burned or depopulated; fields laid waste; and her people, who have escaped destruction, naked and famishing, flee to their forests at the sight of a stranger. We have asked what fearful visitation of Heaven has laid these settlements in ruins? What destroying pestilence has swept over this land, consigning to oblivion almost its entire population? What mean the smoking ruins of so many habitations? And why is yon fresh sod crimsoned and slippery with the traces of recent murder? We have been pointed to the dark slave-ship hovering over her coast, and have been told that two hundred thousand defenceless beings are annually stolen away, to be murdered on their passage, or consigned for life to a captivity more terrible than death!

We have turned to Asia, and beheld how the demon of her idolatry has worse than debased-has brutalized, the mind of man. Everywhere his despotism has been grievous; here, with merciless tyranny, he has exulted in the misery of his victims. He has rent from the human heart all that was endearing in the charities of life. He has taught the mother to tear away the infant as it smiled in her bosom, and cast it, the shrieking prey, to contending alligators. He has taught the son to light the funeral pile, and

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