in any honest business of life, and by taking an active interest in the advancement of human society, we not only preserve and promote our health, prolong our life, enlarge and invigorate our mental faculties, but likewise experience the highest gratifications of which human nature has been made susceptible; or the gratifications of distinction, usefulness, and of moral and intellectual worth.

The materials given by the Creator, including the surface of the earth, of what value are they in their rough state, compared with the same materials worked upon and improved by human labour and industry? Is it not by the power and disposition of man to labour, that the great end has mainly been secured? What else is the reason that all useful arts have increased in estimation progressively with an increasing civilization; while all those which only minister to the gratification of a depraved nature, are daily becoming more insecure? Well may Mr. Dewey ask,* "what is there glorious in the world, that is not the product of labour, either of the mind or body? What is history but its records? What are cultivated fields but its toil? The busy

* Moral Views of Commerce, Society, and Politics. By the Rev. Orville Dewey. London: 1838. P. 97.

markets, the rising cities, the enriched empires of the world, what are they but the great treasure-house of labour? The pyramids of Egypt, the castles, towns and temples raised by human hands, the buried cities of Italy and Mexico, what are they but tracks of the mighty footsteps of labour? Antiquity had not been without it. Without it there would be no present enjoyments nor any hopes for the future?" Ever blessed and honoured therefore be the spirit of honest industry wheresoever it be found, and in whatever way it exert itself. And if the inactive only knew, what a delight there is in the energetic exertion of every noble faculty, and in the gratification felt after having successfully surmounted difficulties, I am perfectly sure, that they would no longer refuse to themselves an enjoyment with which no other earthly pleasure can be compared.

And can we still doubt that God, who does nothing without a wise purpose, by elevating us so far above all irrational beings, and by blessing us with the divine gift of reason, intended that man should become an agent, an originator of moral good or moral evil, and not a mere machine, determined by outward influence, or by a secret yet resistless efficiency of God, which virtually would make Him the author of

all human actions? Is not this free agency, or moral freedom, also recognised in the common consciousness of every intelligent being? is it not involved in all moral judgments and affections, which constitute the fountain of all superior feeling and happiness, and which give to social life its whole interest? Has God then imposed upon us no mission ?—and this mission, what can it be, but to work out our own happiness? If however the feeling of wants, moral, intellectual and physical; and the struggle to satisfy their cravings, is our natural employment-our destiny; is it not warring with Providence to shun all labour, whether of the mind or body? Have we the slightest reason to expect that we shall come unscathed, not to say victorious, out of such an unequal struggle?Can we expect that a wise and just Providence will permit us to sin against so important a law of the creation without punishing us for it; or without depriving us of a greater or less amount of our enjoyments?-Nay, be assured that in every case in which the laws of nature have been violated, nothing but evil can follow. Nature never bends, nor will she stoop to listen to our complaints. If we discover that our acts are in contravention to her immutable laws, we must either amend our conduct, or bear the

consequences. What are all those disappointments and calamities with which a wise and just Providence from time to time afflicts us, but salutary lessons to remind us of its everlasting laws and our own follies ?-What are they but a somewhat rough physic and discipline used by the Most High for our own benefit, to try our strength, to ameliorate our temper, and to develope in us all those cardinal virtues which alone can give worth and energy to our character? Depend upon it, of the best men that ever have adorned human nature, nine out of ten have passed the "Bridge of sighs." Therefore, never despair! the great art of life consists in fortitude and perseverance. All the afflictions which God sends, we have to consider as the mainspring of our improvement; for nothing that in any way has adorned mankind, or contributed to the progress of human happiness, has emanated from a state of peace and tranquillity, but, on the contrary, nearly always from struggle and difficulty. Could there be fortitude without disease, justice without wrongs? Nay, does not the history of almost every great man teach us, that all such vicissitudes are not only a blessing to man, but that, to bring him fully out, or to develope all his faculties to the utmost, he must be thrown on his own resources?

. In fact, the struggles by which alone a man can come to eminence or distinction in any honourable career of life, and in a state of society worth living in, are so severe, that no external aid and advice can ever supply in him the want of inward energy. It is therefore by no other human powers, except by the well cultivated and well directed innate energy of our own mind and character, that we may hope to become the masters instead of the slaves of circumstances:

"The Gods, in bounty, work up storms about us,
That give mankind occasion to exert

Their hidden strength, and throw out into practice
Virtues which shun the day, and lie conceal'd

In the smooth season and the calms of life.-Cato.

Can we then doubt any longer that it is for our own good, and for our happiness, that, according to a wise scheme of Providence, man cannot prosper, except by the exercise of his own faculties, mental as well as physical? that the road to happiness goes through temptations and difficulties? that he who wishes to enjoy the prize of victory, or to wear the crown of glory, must struggle for it? Impossible!

Further, to grumble against Providence, that it permits evil as well as good, is just as reasonable as to deprecate freedom, because through it occasionally comes forth evil; a mere ex