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of circumstances, the slave of outward goods and advantages, the slave of everything that he ought to command.

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.. I know that he must toil and care for these things. But wherefore? Why must he toil and care? For a reason, I answer, which still urges upon him the very point we are considering. It had been as easy for the Almighty to have caused nature spontaneously to bring forth all that man needs, to have built as a part of the frame of the earth enduring houses for us to dwell in, to have filled them with all requisite comforts, and to have relieved us, in short, from the necessity of labour and business. Why has he not done thus? Still, I answer, for the same cause, with the same moral design, as that with which the world was made. Activity is designed for mental improvement; industry for moral discipline; business for the cultivation of manly and high and noble virtues. When, therefore, a man enters into the active pursuits of life, though he pleads the cares of business as an excuse for his neglect,—yet it is then especially, and that by the very teaching of Providence, that he should be reminded of his spiritual welfare. He could not with safety to his moral being-this is the theory of his condition;-he could not, with safety, be turned full and free into the domain of nature. He goes forth, therefore, bearing burdens burdens of care, and wearing the shackles of necessity. The arm that he stretches out to his toil wears a chain, for he must work. And on the tablet where immortal thoughts are to be written, he writes words, soon to be erased, indeed, but words of worldly care and foresight, for he must provide. And yet, how strange and passing strange is it! the occu

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pations and objects that were given for discipline, and the trial of the spirit, and the training of it to virtue, are made the ultimate end and the chief good; yes, these which were designed for humble means of good to the soul, are made the engrossing pursuits, the absorbing pleasures and possessions, in which the soul itself is forgotten and lost!

Thus spiritual in its design is nature. Thus spiritual in its just aspects is the scene of life; no dull scene when rightly regarded; no merely wearisome, uncompensated toil, or perplexing business; but a ministration to purposes of infinite greatness and sublimity.

We are speaking of human interests. God also looks upon the interest of his creatures. But he seeth not as man seeth. Man looketh on the outward appearance, but God looketh on the heart. He sees that all human interests centre there. He sees there the gathering, the embosoming, the garnering up of all that is precious to an immortal creature. Therefore it is that, as the strongest proof of his love to the world, he gave his Son to live for our teaching and guidance, and to die for our redemption from sin and death and hell. Every bright example, every pure doctrine, every encouraging promise, every bitter pang endured, points. to the soul for its great design and end. And let me say, that if I have seemed to any one to speak in language over refined or spiritual, I can no otherwise understand the teachings of the great Master. His words would often be mystery and extravagance to me if I did not feel that the soul is everything, and that the world is nothing but what it is to the soul. With this perception of the true value of things, I require no transcendental piety; I require nothing but

common sense to understand what he says when he pronounces men to be deaf, and blind, and diseased, and dead in sins; for, to give up the joys of the soul for the joys of sense, to neglect the heart for the outward condition, to forego inward good in the eagerness for visible good, to forget and to forsake God amidst his very works and mercies-this is, indeed, a mournful blindness, a sad disorder of the rational nature; and, when the evil is consummated, it is a moral death! True, there may be no tears for it, save in here and there one who retires from the crowd to think of the strange delusion, and the grievous misfortune, and the degrading unworthiness. There are no tokens of public mourning for the calamity of the soul. Men weep when the body dies; and when it is borne to its last rest, they follow it with sad and mournful procession. But for the dying soul there is no open lamentation; for the lost soul there are no obsequies. And yet, when the great account of life is made up-though the words we now speak can but approach to the truth and may leave but slight impression-the things we may then remember-God forbid that we should have them to remember!—but the things we may then have to remember-life's misdirected toil, the world's delusions, the thoughts unguarded, the conscience every day violated, the soul for ever neglected-these, oh! these will weigh upon the spirit, like those mountains which men are represented in prophetic vision as vainly calling upon to cover them.

III. But I am now verging upon the third and final argument which I proposed to use for the care of our spiritual interests, and that is to be found in their value.

I have shown that society, in all its pursuits, objects,

and scenes, urges this care; that nature, and providence, and revelation minister to it; and I now say, that the soul is intrinsically and independently worth this care.

Put all consequences to social man out of sight, if it be possible; draw a veil over all the bright and glorious ministry of nature; let the teachings of Providence all be silent; let the gospel be a fable; and still the mind of man has a value which nothing else has, it is worth a care which nothing else is worth, and to the single solitary individual it ought to possess an interest which nothing else possesses.

Indeed, at every step by which we advance in this subject, the contrast between what is and what ought to be, presses upon us. Men very well understand the word value. They know very well what interests are. Offices, stocks, monopolies, mercantile privileges, are interests. Nay, even the chances of profit are interests so dear, that men contend for them, and about them, almost as if they were striving for life. And value— how carefully, and accurately, and distinctly is that quality stamped upon every object in this world! Currency has value, and bonds have value; and broad lands, and freighted ships, and rich mines are all marked down in the table of this strict account. Go to the exchange, and you shall know what they are worth; and you shall know what men will give for them. But the stored treasures of the heart, the unsunned, the unfathomable mines that are to be wrought in the soul, the broad and boundless realms of thought, the freighted ocean of man's affections-of his love, his gratitude, his hope-who will regard them?-who seek for them, as if they were brighter than gold, dearer than treasure?

The mind, I repeat-how little is it known or considered! That all which man permanently is,-the inward being, the divine energy, the immortal thought, the boundless capacity, the infinite aspiration-how few value this, this wonderful mind, for what it is worth! How few see it-that brother mind-in others; see it in all the forms of splendour and wretchedness alike—see it, though fenced around with all the artificial distinctions of society-see it, through the rags with which poverty has clothed it, beneath the crushing burthens of life, amidst the close pressure of worldly troubles, wants, and sorrows-see it, and acknowledge and cheer it in that humble lot, and feel that the nobility of earth, that the commencing glory of heaven, is there! Nor is this the worst, nor the strongest view of the case. Men do not feel the worth of their own minds. They are very proud, perhaps; they are proud of their possessions, they are proud of their minds, it may be, as distinguishing them; but the intrinsic, the inward, the infinite worth of their own minds they do not perceive. How many a man is there who would feel, if he were introduced into some magnificent palace, and were led through a succession of splendid apartments, filled with rich and gorgeous furniture-would feel, I say, as if he, lofty immortal being as he is, were but an ordinary thing amidst the tinselled show around him; or would feel as if he were a more ordinary being, for the perishing glare of things amidst which he walked! How many a man, who, as he passed along the way-side, saw the chariot of wealth rolling by him, would forget the intrinsic and eternal dignity of his own mind, in a poor degrading envy of that vain pageant-would feel himself to be a

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