through Sardis in royal state, with a diadem upon his head. One of the king's relatives answered him: "Demaratus, this diadem does not carry brains along with it to cover; nor would you be Jupiter, though you should take hold of his thun

der."

the issues of it as the greatest of its hopes. But ambition is full of distractions; it teems with stratagems, and is swelled with expectations as with a tympany. It sleeps sometimes as the wind in a storm, still and quiet for a minute, that t may burst out into an impetuous blast, till the cordage of his heartstrings crack. It fears when none is

Such a reply might be given to those ambitious souls who aspire to an exaltation that they are un-nigh, and prevents things that never worthy of, and imagine that the had intention, and falls under the inrobes of office, or the position of evitability of such incidents which power, can give them the faculties either could not be foreseen or not necessary for the station that they prevented. It is an infinite labour seek. A king's crown may be set to make a man's self miserable, upon an imbecile head, but it will and the utmost acquist is so goodly not make a fool a monarch. a purchase, that he makes his days full of sorrow to enjoy the troubles of a three years' reign. Therefore there is no greater unreasonableness in the world than in the designs of ambition; for it makes the present certainly miserable, unsatisfied, troublesome, and discontented, for the uncertain acquisition of an honour which nothing can secure ; and besides a thousand possibilities of miscarrying, it relies upon no greater certainty than our life; and when we are dead, all the world sees who was the fool.

Ambition to be Avoided.—“I see that candle," says Warwick, "makes small show in the day which at night yields a glorious lustre, not because the candle has then more light, but because the air hath the more darkness. How prejudicial then is that ambition which makes me seem less than I am, by presuming to make me greater than I should be! They whose glory shines as the sparks amongst stubble, lose their light if compared to the Sun of glory. I will not seat myself higher than my place, lest I should be disgraced to a humility; but if I place myself lower than my seat, I may be advanced to the honour of, Friend, sit up higher.' I had rather be exalted by my humility, than be brought low by my exaltation."

To the above may be added the following from Jeremy Taylor: - Ambition is the most troublesome and vexatious passion that can afflict the sons of men. Virtue hath not half so much trouble in it, for it sleeps quietly, without startings and affrighted fancies: it looks cheerfully, smiles with much serenity, and though it laughs not often, yet it is ever delightful in the apprehension of some faculty. It fears no man, nor no thing, nor is it ever discomposed, and hath no concernments in the great alterations of the world, and entertains death like a friend, and reckons

Holy Ambition. The famous battle of Marathon had been fought, in which Miltiades led his little army of ten thousand men against a force of three hundred thousand Persians. After his glorious victory, Miltiades became for the hour a nation's idol. Themistocles, then a youth, was observed to be remarkably pensive and sad, refusing to join in his accustomed amusements, and often spending whole nights in thought and wakefulness. When asked the cause of this change in his deportment, he answered, "The trophies of Miltiades will not suffer me to sleep." His whole soul was possessed with the desire to become alike distinguished among his countrymen. To this end he bent every purpose of his soul. Scorning fatigue and ease, he planned, and laboured, and studied, until he had placed his name high on the scroll of fame.

He created a navy, which enabled Greece to cope with Persia on the sea, and to win a glorious and decisive victory over the great leader Xerxes.

glory before him? What care, what pains and watchings, are too great to expend for such a prize? If Themistocles could thus give up the follies and pleasures of youth Yet what were the perishing to make himself a strong and vahonours of Miltiades compared liant soldier, cannot you forego whatwith the glorious crown set before ever would disqualify you from bethe faithful young soldier of the coming a good soldier of Jesus Cross? If a perishing garland of Christ? There are powerful foes

laurel or bay could so fire the to be met both without and withheart, what should be the enthu- in, and the soldier must be ever at siasm of one who has immortal his post.

ANGELS.

"Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation."--Heb. i. 14.

JACOB Saw angels ascending and descending, but none standing still. -Bernard.

A WICKED angel came to Eve, in order that through her man might be separated from God. A good angel came to Mary, that through her God might be united to man. Fulgentius.

THE angels glorify, men scrutinise; angels raise their voices in praise, men in disputation; they conceal their faces with their wings, but man, with a presumptuous gaze, would look into God's unspeakable glory.-Chrysostom.

will about to every part of the universe. This is their delight. They bless God, who vouchsafes thus to employ them. But when they have fulfilled God's message, then they return back to Him by whom they were sent forth. They return back to Him, and stand before Him, drinking in fresh streams of life, and strength, and purity, and joy from His presence.-Hare.

Angelic Ministration.—I did not see, early in the morning, the flight of those birds that filled all the bushes and all the orchard trees, but they were there, though I did not see their coming and heard their songs afterward. It does not matter whether you have ministered to you yet those perceptions by which you perceive angelic existence. The fact that we want to

bear in mind is, that we are environed by them, that we move in their midst. How, where, what

Guardian Angels.-The Fathers of the Christian Church taught that every human being, from the hour of his birth to that of his death, is accompanied by an angel appointed to watch over him. The Mahometans give to each of us a good and evil angel; but the early Christians supposed us to be attended each by the philosophy is, whether it be a good angel only, who undertakes that office, not merely from duty spiritual philosophy, no man can tell, to God, and out of obedience and and they least that think they know The fact which we great humility, but as inspired by exceeding charity and love towards his human charge. Mrs. Jameson.

The Chariots of God.-Angels are called the chariots of God. "The chariots of God are thousands of angels." That is, they are the chariots of His will, they bear His

most about it.

prize and lay hold of is this, that angelic ministration is a part, not of the heavenly state, but of the universal condition of men, and that, as soon as we become Christ's, we come not to the home of the living God, but to the "innumerable company of angels."-Beecher.

depths of redemption, and the joys of their love; but what must strike us more than all, is the perfect harmony of the whole, that all these features agree and are maintained in their justest proportions. In a word, this doctrine, sustained from one end of Scripture to the other, bears the most striking testimony to its inspiration from God. While all the mythologies tell us of the inhabitants of the moon and the planets, the Bible does not contain one word about them; it tells

What are Angels ?" The very names assigned to angels," says Dwight, "by their Creator, convey to us ideas pre-eminently pleasing, fitted to captivate the heart and exalt the imagination; ideas which dispel gloom, banish despondency, enliven hope, and awaken sincere and unmingled joy. They are living ones; beings in whom life is inherent and instinctive; who sprang up under the quickening influence of the Sun of Righteousness, beneath the morning of everlasting day; who rose expanded, us nothing of the second heaven; and blossomed in the uncreated but it depicts the inhabitants of the beam, on the banks of the river of third heaven, or the heaven of healife, and were nourished by the vens. Descriptions of the angels are waters of immortality. They are numerous without wearying, and spirits, winged with activity, and full of details. They are exhibited formed with power, which no labour to us in every situation, in heaven wearies and no duration impairs; and upon earth, before God and their faculties always fresh and before men, ministers of mercy, young, their exertions unceasing and sometimes executors of venand wonderful, and their destina- geance; standing before God, adortion noble and delightful, without ing Him day and night; but also example, and without end. They employed in the service of the are burning ones, glowing with a humblest believer. We are defiled, pure and serene, with an intense they are perfect; we are selfish, and immortal flame of divine love; they melt with charity; we are returning, without ceasing, the haughty, they are gentle; we are light and warmth which they have vain and proud in bodies that received from the great central Sun worms consume, they are humble of the universe, reflecting with in glory and immortality; we are supreme beauty the image of that disturbed by passions, they are divine luminary; and universally fervent in spirit,-neither can they glorious, although differing from die. This uniformity, this purity, each other in glory." comes not from man-it is from God."

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The Angels of Scripture. "Peo- Says a living writer: "It might be ple at all times have taken pleasure," supposed that beings like them (anpoints out Robert Hall, in paint-gels), whose bodies are spiritual, and ing those invisible beings, inhabit- whose natural rank is far higher ants of celestial regions, adorned than our own, would not find conwith all those superior qualities genial objects of attention and symthat charm the heart of man. But pathy in animal bodies like ours, how low, puerile, and vulgar are all especially as our moral nature is their conceptions! Study the angels evil; yet several facts in Holy of the Scriptures; not only is every- Scripture show that it is otherwise, thing there grand, holy, and worthy and that in the instances of Hagar, of God; not only is their character Elijah, and Christ, practical expresat once ardent and sublime, com- sions of sympathy with physical passionate and majestic, constantly suffering were evoked." These facts brought before us there by their show that "it is not felt to be benames, their attributes, their em- neath the dignity of those high and ployments, their habitations, their holy ones to come forth to minister songs, their contemplation of the to the bodily wants of men."

ANGER.

"The discretion of a man deferreth his anger."-Prov. xix. 11.

"WHEN anger rises," counsels the Chinese philosopher Confucius, "think of the consequences."

IF anger is not restrained, it is frequently more hurtful to us than the injury that provokes it.

Seneca.

Matthew

"WISE anger," says Henry, "is like fire from the flint; there is a great ado to bring it out; and when it does come, it is out again immediately."

ANGER is like the waves of a troubled sea; when it is corrected with a soft reply, as with a little strand, it retires, and leaves nothing behind but froth and shells -no permanent mischief.-Jeremy Taylor.

"I AM naturally as irritable as any," confesses Adam Clarke; "but when I find anger, or passion, or any other evil temper arise in my mind, immediately I go to my Redeemer, and, confessing my sins, I give myself up to be managed by Him."

Anger Quick and Easy of Growth. —A lady once came to a minister, complaining that she was the chief of sinners, the worst of transgressors, utterly lost and helpless. He replied, "I have no doubt, madam, that you are bad enough." She instantly flew into a passion, and declared that she was than her neighbours, accused him of slandering her, and from her gestures she would perhaps have proceeded to violence had he not suddenly retired from the room.

no worse

one

The Slave to Anger.-"What a chain of evils,"exclaims St. Ephraim, "does that man prepare for himself who is a slave to anger! He is the murderer of his own soul; yea to the letter he is so, for he lives in a continual torment. He is devoured by an inward fire, and his body partakes of his sufferings. Terror reigns around him; every dreads lest the most innocent, the most trifling occurrence, may give him a pretext for quarrel, or rouse him into fury. A passionate man A Soft Answer. When Sir is odious alike to God and man, Matthew Hale once dismissed a and is insupportable even to himjury, because he was convinced self." that it had been illegally chosen to favour the Protector, the latter was highly displeased with him; and when Sir Matthew returned from the circuit, Cromwell told him in anger that he was not fit to be a judge; to which all the answer he made was that it was very true.

Righteous Anger. High and gusty passions that sweep through the soul are sometimes like fierce summer storms that cleanse the air and give the earth refreshment by strong winds and down-pelting rains. Men are better for knowing how to be angry, provided the sun does not go down on their wrath, and provided it is justified by the occasions of it.-Beecher.

The Power of Evil Passions.Let a man be always on his guard lest his evil passions should run away with him. A little weakly lad on the back of a great carthorse pulls with all his might to stop the powerful beast, but in vain, for the cart-horse takes him just where he pleases. It is just the same when evil passions get the better of a man, for they bear him away like the cart-horse, without his having the power to control them, and he seldom if ever will get out of a passion without finding that he has lost something he had better have kept.

How to Turn Anger to Profit.St. Chrysostom says that anger is

implanted in us as a sort of sting, in vain upon a subject which is to make us gnash with our teeth incapable of any injury therefrom. against the devil, to make us But if the paw of a bear meet with vehement against him, not to set so thin a substance as the caul of us in array against each other. We a man's heart, how easily is it torn have arms given us, not to make to pieces! Every action is then most war among ourselves, but that we speedily finished when the subject may employ our whole armour on which it works is thereunto against our spiritual adversary. prepared. Far easier is it to make Art thou prone to anger? Be so a print in wax than in an adamant; against thine own sins: chastise to kindle a fire in dry stubble than thy soul, scourge thy conscience, in green wood. Now wicked men be a severe judge and merciless have fitted themselves for wrath, in thy sentence against thy own and are the procurers and artificers sins. This is the way to turn of their own destruction. They are anger to profit. It was for this vessels; and God is never without that God implanted wrath within us. treasures of wrath; so that the Anger Controlled.--We must confusion of a wicked man is but not forget to make our prayers to like the drawing of water out of God, that He who giveth wisdom a fountain, or the filling of a bag liberally and upbraideth not would out of a heap of treasure." teach us the wisdom of governing Anger Harboured.-Speech endour passions, and by the aid of His eth anger, silence nourisheth it. Holy Spirit give us the victory over Much malice and grudge would be them; that He would create in us avoided, and the very poison of it a clean heart, and renew a right drawn out, did we but give it a spirit within us, and sanctify us vent at first, by reasoning with the throughout. When an unruly pas-party that wronged us, and exsion is subdued and a bad temper postulating the injury, which most corrected, we have as it were times is but a mere mistake. Now obtained a new nature; and this many, on the contrary, harbour is to be born anew, or of God. For this viper in their bosoms till it these great blessings we must hath eaten to their hearts; they depend upon God by daily prayer. not only let "the sun go down," And all our vigilance and pains but go its whole round, "upon with ourselves, and our earnest their wrath" (Ephes. iv. 26), and entreaties at the throne of grace, cannot find time from one end of we must particularly apply against the sin that does so easily beset us. -Hickman.

the year to the other to utter their minds and compound their discords. Not only Abraham, but Aristippus shall rise up in judgment against such pseudo-Christians, and condemn them. For when Æschines and he had been at long debate, and there was "I stout," and "Thou stout," and neither could find in their hearts to go to the other, Aristippus went at length to

Divine Anger. "Anger, we know," says Bishop Reynolds, "is the whetstone of strength: in an equality of other terms, it will make a man prevail. Nothing is able to stand before a fire which is once enraged. Now God's displeasure is kindled, and breaketh forth into a flame, against the sins schines, and said unto him, of men; like a devouring lion, or "Shall we not agree to be friends a bereaved bear, like the implacable before we make ourselves a common rage of a jealous man, so doth the scorn to the whole country?" Wherefire of the Lord's revenge break unto, when Eschines answered forth upon the enemies of His Son. that "he was content to be friends Add hereunto our disposition and with all his heart," Aristippus preparedness for the wrath of God. replied, "Remember, then, that Strength itself may be tired out although I was the elder and the