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lamentation. They are words that should make a man weep when he pronounces them, and most of all when he applies them to himself, or to his fellow-men. But what now is the inference from all this? Is it, that man is an utterly debased, degraded, and contemptible creature?—that there is nothing in him to be revered or respected?-that the human heart presents nothing to us but a mark for cold and blighting reproach? Without wishing to assert anything paradoxical, it seems to me that the very reverse is the inference.

I should reason thus upon this point. I should say, it must be a noble creature that can so offend. I should say, there must be a contrast of light and shade, to make the shade so deep. It is no ordinary being, surely-it is a being of conscience, of moral powers and glorious capacities, that calls from us such intense reproach and indignation. We never so arraign the animal creation. The very power of sinning is a lofty and awful power! It is, in the language of our holiest poet, "the excess of glory observed." Neither is it a power standing alone. It is not a solitary, unqualified, diabolical power of evil; a dark and cold abstraction of wickedness. No, it is clothed with other qualities. No, it has dread attendants-attendants, I had almost said, that dignify even the wrong. A waiting conscience, visitings-oh! visitings of better thoughts, calls of honour and self-respect, come to the sinner; terrific admonition whispering on his secret ear; prophetic warning pointing him to the dim and veiled shadows of future retribution; and the all-penetrating, all-surrounding idea of an avenging God, are present with him and the right arm of the felon and the trans

gressor is lifted up, amidst lightnings of conviction and thunderings of reproach. I can tremble at such a being as this; I can pity him; I can weep for him; but I cannot scorn him.

The very words of condemnation which we apply to sin are words of comparison. When we describe the act of the transgressor as mean, for instance, we recognize, I repeat, the nobility of his nature; and when we say that his offence is a degradation, we imply a certain distinction. And so to do wrong implies a noble power-the very power which constitutes the glory of heaven-the power to do right. And thus it is, as I apprehend, that the inspired teachers speak of the wickedness and unworthiness of man. They seem to do it under a sense of his better capacities and higher distinction. They speak as if he had wronged himself. And when they use the words ruín and perdition, they announce, in affecting terms, the worth of that which is reprobate and lost. Paul, when speaking of his transgressions, says, "not I, but the sin that dwelleth in me." There was a better nature in him, that resisted evil, though it did not always successfully resist. And we read of the Prodigal Son,-in terms which have always seemed to me of the most affecting import—that when he came to the sense of his duty he "came-to himself." Yes, the sinner is beside himself; and there is no peace, no reconciliation of his conduct to his nature, till he returns from his evil ways. Shall we not say, then, that his nature demands virtue and rectitude to satisfy it?

True it is, and I would not be one to weaken nor obscure the truth, that man is sinful; but he is not

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satisfied with sinning. Not his conscience only, but his wants, his natural affections, are not satisfied. He pays deep penalties for his transgressions. And these sufferings proclaim a higher nature. The pain, the disappointment, the dissatisfaction, that wait on an evil course, show that the human soul was not made to be the instrument of sin, but its lofty avenger. The desolated affections, the haggard countenance, the pallid and sunken cheek, the sighings of grief, proclaim that these are ruins indeed; but they proclaim that something noble has fallen into ruin-proclaim it by signs mournful, yet venerable, like the desolations of an ancient temple, like its broken walls and falling columns, and the hollow sounds of decay that sink down heavily among its deserted recesses. The sinner, I repeat it, is a sufferer. happiness in low and unworthy objects sin: but he does not find it there-and that is his glory. No, he does not find it there: he returns disappointed and melancholy; and there is nothing on earth so eloquent as his grief. Read it in the pages of a Byron and a Burns. There is nothing in literature so touching as these lamentations of noble but erring natures, in the vain quest of a happiness which sin and the world can never give. The sinner is often dazzled by earthly fortune and pomp, but it is in the very midst of these things, that he sometimes most feels their emptiness; that his higher nature most feels that it is solitary and unsatisfied. It is in the giddy whirl of frivolous pursuits and amusements that his soul oftentimes is sick and weary with trifles and vanities: that "he says of laughter, it is mad; and of mirth, what doeth it?"

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And yet it is not bare disappointment, nor the mere destitution of happiness caused by sin,-it is not these alone that give testimony to a better nature. There is a higher power that bears sway in the human heart. It is remorse-sacred, uncompromising remorse, that will hear of no selfish calculations of pain and pleasure; that demands to suffer; that, of all sacrifices on earth, save those of benevolence, brings the only willing victim. What lofty revenge does the abused soul thus take for its offences: never, no, never, in all its anger, punishing another, as, in its justice, it punishes itself!

Such, then, are the attributes that still dwell in the dark grandeur of the soul; the beams of original light, of which amidst its thickest darkness it is never shorn. That in which all the nobleness of earth resides should not be condemned even, but with awe and trembling. It is our treasure; and if this is lost, all is lost. Let us take care, then, that we be not unjust. Man is not an angel; but neither is he a demon, nor a brute. The evil he does is not committed with brutish insensibility, nor with diabolical satisfaction. And the evil, too, is often disguised under forms that do not, at once, permit him to see its real character. His affections become wrong by excess; passions bewilder; semblances delude; interests ensnare; example corrupts. And yet no tyrant over men's thoughts, no unworthy seeker of their adulation, no pander for their guilty pleasures, could ever make the human heart what he would. And in making it what he has, he has often found that he had to work with stubborn materials. No perseverance of endeavour, nor devices of ingenuity, nor depths of artifice, have ever equalled

those which are sometimes employed to corrupt the heart from its youthful simplicity and uprightness.

In endeavouring to state the views which are to be entertained of human nature, I have, at present, and before I reverse the picture, but one further observation to make and that is on the spirit and tone with which it is to be viewed and spoken of. I have wished, even in speaking of its faults, to awaken a feeling of reverence and regret for it, such as would arise within us, on beholding a noble but mutilated statue, or the work of some divine architect in ruins, or some majestic object in Nature which had been marred by the rending of this world's elements and changes. Above all other objects, surely human nature deserves to be regarded with these sentiments. The ordinary tone of conversation in allusion to this subject, the sneering remark on mankind, as a set of poor and miserable creatures, the cold and bitter severity, whether of philosophic scorn, or theological rancour, become no being; least of all, him who has part in this common nature. He, at least, should speak with consideration and tenderness. And if he must speak of faults and sins, he would do well to imitate an Apostle, and to tell these things, even weeping. His tone should be that of forbearance and pity. His words should be recorded in a Book of Lamentations. "How is the gold become dim," he might exclaim in the words of an ancient lamentation-" how is the gold become dim, and the most fine gold changed! The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how are they esteemed but as earthen vessels, the work of the hands of the potter!"

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