Mary. "But what reminded me particularly of him in the sermon was,"

A. Lucy. "Stop, dear Mary! do not let us apply the sermon to others, but rather to ourselves; it may often happen that a passage in a sermon will strike us as very applicable to our neighbours, but we should instantly check the thought. We cannot too carefully remember, that our duty in listening to a sermon is, to apply it to our own hearts, and to gain some useful hints, some holy teaching, that may help us on our road. Mr. Gray, himself, has perhaps been a warning both to you and me, not to fall into the vice pointed out in the first part of the sermon, but what shall we say to the instances of hypocrisy mentioned in the last?"

Mary. "I cannot tell exactly to what you refer; I must confess, that my thoughts wandered, and I could not fix them steadily to-day; Thinking about Mr. Gray, made me think of my mother, and home, and I could not attend afterwards."

A. Lucy. "This shows you the mischief of giving way to the first wrong or wandering thought, that tries to distract us; the devil cares not by what means he can draw our minds off from what is good; and he rejoices, when he has introduced some train of thought, which effectually closes our ears to the words of Christ, preached by his minister."

Mary. "Do tell me, Aunt Lucy, what instances of hypocrisy did Mr. A. speak of, that you thought applied

to me.

A. Lucy. "Not to you, Mary, more than to me, as far as I know; it is a subject on which each must judge their own hearts, and it is one on which all Christians, I believe, find much to deplore and repent of; the careless and imperfect nature of our devotions, both in public and in private."

Mary. "But how can this be hypocrisy ?"

A. Lucy. "What was the sin with which our Saviour charged the Pharisees? Was it not, with their ostentatious observance of the outward forms of religion; while their hearts remained uninfluenced by the vital spirit, which only gives life to those forms? Is it not hypocrisy

towards God, and towards man, to attend in God's church, to assemble at His altar, while our hearts are far from Him, and the daily actions of our lives in direct opposition to all we then repeat, and profess to believe? Is it not also hypocrisy, when we kneel down, and repeat with our lips the solemn words of our service, and meanwhile our thoughts are far from them, engaged by some trifle, carrying on some worldly plan, or worse, positively engaged in sin; when can we say that our thoughts have never wandered during the whole time of service? Can we even find one part of that service, during which we have prayed earnestly and without interruption?

Mary. "It is very true, Aunt Lucy, and I was ashamed the other Sunday, when you said, you wished for a hassock to kneel upon, but you would not interrupt me, because I was saying my prayers so attentively; I felt that I was a hypocrite, for that Sunday, my thoughts were wandering, and I do not think I said one prayer attentively, and I could not confess this to you."

A. Lucy. "The more we know of our own hearts, the

more we shall be shocked at the self-deceit that exists there; we are not only hypocrites towards others, but before God and our own hearts."

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Mary. But, Aunt Lucy, if I strive ever so hard, I cannot keep my thoughts always steady to my prayers.'

A. Lucy. "Perhaps not, Mary; all our services partake of the imperfections of our nature; but, the question with us should be, if we do all we can to conquer this imperfection in our prayers. Mr. A. gave us some excellent advice on this head, and also, very justly reproved us for our carelessness; at least, I felt that his reproof was deserved; he spoke as one, who had experienced the difficulty, but had considered well how it could be lessened; and certainly if we prepared our hearts and minds as he directed, for the service of God, we should find a great difference."

Mary. "What did he recommend, Aunt Lucy?"

A. Lucy. To prepare for Sunday on Saturday evening; that is, to settle as far as possible all our worldly business, and especially any thing likely to weigh on our minds, and distract our thoughts-so that we might lie down on

Saturday night with our thoughts free, and awake, in the morning, with a full recollection that it is Sunday.”

Mary.-"That was my first fault this morning then, for I quite forgot that it was Sunday, till I was nearly dressed."

A. Lucy." He bade us, also, take care to be ready quite in time for Church, so that we might come leisurely and soberly; and to take care, that in walking to Church, we engaged in no light and trifling conversation, that so we might enter God's house in a devout and proper frame of mind."

Mary." This is not always in our own power, for if we are walking with others, we cannot avoid talking.'

A. Lucy.- "A great deal is in our own power, Mary; for instance, if we cannot walk to Church silently, we may contrive to go early enough to have five minutes before the service begins, to recollect ourselves; even when we walk with talkative companions, we may avoid joining others on the road: it is surprising, if we are really anxious to do any thing, how many of these little difficulties vanish."

Mary. "What else did Mr. A. tell us to do?"

A. Lucy." He told us that we should employ our leisure on Sunday morning in examining ourselves, so that we might the better understand, and be ready to apply, the prayers to our own case. If we came to Church, he asked, with a serious sense of our sins, and an earnest desire for pardon, should we be able to repeat the confession so heedlessly, and listen to the absolution so carelessly? and here, he warned us against an error, not uncommon among devout Christians, that of endeavouring to call to mind their own individual sins, at the time of the general confession; this, he said, should be done previously, not at the time, when it would surely lead our thoughts astray, and we should be lost to the rest of the service. He bade us, also, carefully repel the first wandering thought; there might be no harm in the thought itself, yet it would be very mischievous to us then, in drawing us away from the subject of our prayers. Another proof of our hypocrisy, he told us, was our careful observance of public prayer, as far as the outward

form is concerned, compared with our observance of private prayer. It would be, he said, a consolation to him, as the pastor of this little flock, if he could hope, that those whom he knew to be careless in offering up their public worship to God, were diligent in daily, pri vate prayer: but experience had forced him to believe otherwise; and that too many, who, out of regard to decency and custom, or from early habit, came to Church, never offered any regular private prayers; the best that could be said of such cold worshippers is, that they deceive themselves; but he entreated them to examine their own hearts by this new test, and see, if they really came to Church to serve God, or from some mere worldly motive."

Mary." I have sometimes thought, Aunt Lucy, that I should be very much ashamed, if others could know how little I have attended at Church."

A. Lucy." It is so, Mary, and Mr. A., for this very reason, reproached us with hypocrisy. We come out of Church easy and self-satisfied because no human eye knows how careless we have been; but our business in Church is not with man, but God; and though every human eye may be deceived, God cannot be mocked; He looks at the heart, and He may say to us, as to the Pharisees of old; Woe unto you, hypocrites; ye draw nigh unto me with your mouth and honour me with your lips, but your heart is far from me.'" E. A.

A WORD TO MY COTTAGE FRIENDS ON HELPING ONE

ANOTHER.

My dear Friends,-I take this method of addressing you upon a subject, which if attended to, would, besides the blessing attendant upon it, be a means of increased comfort to you all. It has often been a matter of surprise to myself, as well as many other cottage visitors, that there is not more kindly feeling for one another than is often found. I know, and would in the first place beg you to remember, that this feeling, unless grounded upon religion, is partial and uncertain; but I have often found,

where there is a show (at least) of religion, and a desire to be thought, and even to be really a Christian, this duty is apparently lost sight of entirely. It seems as if the poor imagined that to be charitable (in this sense of the word) belongs only to the rich, and because they cannot give money they cannot therefore do good, true indeed it is, that according to our power of relieving the wants of others, we shall be answerable; and I heartily wish this was more felt among ourselves than it is: but my present object is to show my cottage friends how they can do good, and how much it is in their power to relieve their fellow-creatures; and, in the hope of doing this more clearly, I will describe one or two cases by which the duty may be illustrated.

Let us first describe what we have found at the cottages of three labourers which we have visited. The first was that of a hard-working man, whose wife was far from strong in health, but clean and industrious; her cottage was therefore clean and neat, for it was Saturday, and the day which follows was not forgotten as a day of holy rest. We found this good woman quite tired with her work, for she said she could not afford to pay for help. The next cottage we visited was inhabited by a man and his wife, with three little children, the eldest of whom was scarcely able to take care of herself, and the woman was working hard to get her cottage neat and clean for the holy Sabbath, as we were delighted to hear her call that blessed day. The next cottage was of a sadly different nature; here we found the mother of a large family toiling at her work, and scolding six or seven children of various ages, from seven or eight to sixteen: had we gone on any other day, this would not have been the case, for she sent her children to school; but that would not have answered our purpose. When we remarked upon the sadly uncomfortable state of things, she replied that it was Saturday, and there never was any peace when the children were at home, for they made "more work than enough." I will not now enlarge on the sad account which will be required of parents who have neglected to train their children in the way they