begun to destroy. There is another lured into dishonest ways. There is a third becoming the victim of licentiousness. There is a whole cluster, tiring of work, becoming idle, aimless, good-for-nothing. How many shipwrecks take place year after year from such causes, and in how many other cases, where the wreck is not complete, do we see the man and woman crippled for life, trailing a shattered frame along a path alike painful and dishonoured! What a blessing to the working classes, and indeed to all, if any one could hold them up, could steady and strengthen them, when such perils surround! But Christ is that very friend. Under His guidance they will steer clear of all these rocks and quicksands, they will move erect and steady through all these tempests and hurricanes. From Joseph they will have their ready answer for temptation, "How can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?" The apostle will give them their motto for daily work, "Not slothful in business, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord." The emblem of their course in life will be the "tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth fruit in its season; its leaf also shall not wither." The soaring flight of the king of birds will represent their sublime destiny: “They shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not weary; they shall walk and not faint.”

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Or again, consider the protection and sympathy which Christianity brings to the working man. all ages of the world, oppression has been the heritage of the weak. Those who have had no might to enforce their claims, have commonly been treated as if they had neither rights nor feelings. The poor man has been held down, as if he were fit for nothing better than hewing wood and drawing water. It is the Bible, beyond all doubt, that forms the poor man's charter. From first to last, the Bible stands up for the needy, and him that hath no helper. What withering blasts did the prophets direct against those who ground the faces of the poor, and cheated the hireling of his wages! Then, too, the whole spirit of the Bible is one of respect for man as man— not for a few whom artificial distinctions have raised above others, but for every one that has been made in the likeness of God. And in the New Testament, when the Christian Church is formed, its members are all brethren in Christ. The strong are called to help the weak, the rich are called to succour the poor, and all are called to bear one another's burdens. And the more that true Christianity spreads, the more will this spirit spread with it. The rich man's scorn and the poor man's contumely will more and more become things of the past. The humblest labourer will feel that he has the respect and sym

pathy of those who might otherwise have despised him and trampled on him. Or if, from any cause, it should be otherwise, as a servant of Christ he will have something to reconcile him to his treatment, in the remembrance that even his Divine Master was despised and rejected of men.

Look, again, at the advantage which Christianity would give to the working classes in the management of all their schemes for mutual help. At the present moment, they are profoundly convinced of the great value of the principle of union, but they are in great difficulty how to turn it to account. They feel that the six millions of working men in Great Britain should be a most powerful body, if they were properly united and thoroughly organized. But how to attain this union is the difficulty. They are like men who have got hold of a machine, evidently of marvellous power, but they do not know how to work it. Are we wrong in saying that one of the great difficulties in this matter is the difficulty of management? Societies are formed that seem very hopeful, unions are organized, but they go to pieces, because the managers fall out among themselves, or the members fall foul of the managers. Smooth working among those that do the work is the great desideratum. How comes it that the comparatively smooth working which is found in other

bodies is so difficult of attainment among the working classes? Mainly, we believe, through want of mutual forbearance. Each man is too ready to insist on his own way of doing things, and to quarrel with his brother if he will not adopt it. There is a tendency to force one's own opinion, and a want of due regard for the opinion of others. It is always a delicate thing among equals to preserve each man's freedom. There is needed much friendly consideration, much Christian forbearance, and, where there is no essential lack of principle, much confidence in one another. These qualities, so essential to the working classes in the management of their schemes, true Christianity supplies. It allows freedom to all men, within the limits of what is right and good; but forbearance is one of its prominent graces, and there is no evil which it more carefully guards against, than setting at nought the conscientious scruples of brethren. It requires us, as much as lieth in us, to live peaceably with all men. It counsels us to be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath. It bids us look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. If all these counsels were transferred to the hearts of those who manage for the working classes; if the spirit of these qualities were infused into their mode of conducting business, would not the machine

work far more smoothly, and bring a far higher measure of success?

Another blissful aspect of true Christianity to the sons and daughters of toil, may be found in the sunshine and serenity which it brings. There is infinite truth and beauty in those figures of speech that describe Christ as the "Sun of Righteousness," as the "Light of the morning," "the bright and the morning star." Sunbeams go forth from him continually, and they are continually lighting upon the hearts of his people. Under their influence, toil, which was inflicted as a curse, changes its hue, and gets a touch of brightness; each day's work becomes a moral victory and a holy offering, and the very difficulty and self-denial that attend it, give it a glory when it is fairly done. Of the Christian workman, emphatically it is true :—

"Toiling, rejoicing, sorrowing,

Onward thro' life he goes;

Each morning sees some task begun,
Each evening sees it close:

Something attempted, something done,

Has earned a night's repose."

What shall we say of the sunshine that streams out on him from the open pages of his Bible? Or of the beams of love and peace which fall on him as he begins his Sabbath thinking of his Lord's great victory, and goes on to forecast the rest in glory