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the latter half of life is ever dedicated to the works of godliness, and knowledge, when the days of youth have been squandered in impiety, and ignorance; if tears of feeling ever flow again from the dry eye; if blushes of shame are ever brought back to the hardened cheek, it is to the awful voice, and warning aspect of the Sabbath, more than to any other cause, that mankind are indebted for these wholesome, and pleasing examples of repentance.

To keep the Sabbath in levity, and with every species of ordinary indulgence, is not to keep it at all; it diminishes the probability of improvement, by making us believe, that we have dedicated a day to religion, which we have dedicated to every thing but religion; like all other false piety, it confirms, and supports sin, by inspiring an unmerited approbation of ourselves, and by soothing the useful severity of inward examination; in this, indeed, and in every other similar case, it may be doubtful, whether it were not better to lay aside all pretensions to religion at once, than to quiet our conscience by a belief so powerless, that we cannot sacrifice to it, for the least interval of

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time, the least of all our pleasures. After all I have said, it is but too plain, from whence these trifling arguments for trifling away the Sabbath proceed, they proceed, I fear from that advanced state of wealth, and civilization, which precludes so many human beings from the necessity of any mental exertion, and the example of this, class of society spreads rapidly downwards, destroying as it descends; they learn early to seek for gratification, which is immediate, and become so weakened by long indulgence, that they are incapable of supporting serious thought for a single instant; that vacuity is considered as worse than death, which is not filled up by the exultations of vanity, or the perturbations of sense: Such is the deep infatuation, and the melancholy imbecility of a life of fashionable amusement, called, by the current error of the world, a life of pleasure; but pitied by the good, and wise, as a life of wretchedness, leading to a death of despair.

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Having said thus much upon the manner in which the Sabbath ought not to be passed; it will be still more easy to state the few

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simple rules which that solemn institution calls upon us to fulfil. The first of these is public worship; the great object of every human being should be, his progress in righteousness: and the sanctity of the Sabbath, surely, affords us the most favourable of all occasions for such a communication with our own hearts. What have I done wrong ? In what manner could I have acted more conformably to the spirit of the gospel? What rules for future conduct can I found upon my failures, and my misfortunes? Whence have my joys, and my sorrows sprung? Am I advancing in the great science of life? Is my dominion over present enjoyment strengthened? Is my perception of distant good enlivened? Am I the disciple of Christ? Do I strive by a just, gentle, and benevolent life, to keep my conscience void of offence towards God, and man? This is the true use, and this the proper discipline of the Sabbath: thus live the souls of the just in the dungeons of the flesh, thus the blessings, and glories of the gospel are scattered over the face of the earth.

It is, also, an important part of the duties of the Sabbath, to converse with serious, and

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impressive books: such, above all, as the great, and eloquent ministers of the word have left behind them, for a memorial to all time, for a pillar of light in the desert: by their arguments, their piety, and their learning, the devout Christian will find his reason enlightened, his faith confirmed, his knowledge expanded, his zeal inflamed, and he will rise up from the labours of the dead, to act a wiser, and better part among the living.

On the Sabbath, every man ought to think of death; not to think of death languidly, but to bring it in bold relief before his eyes; to gaze at it as if he were hereafter to meet it, and to learn from that effort of his mind, the most difficult, and the most sublime of all lessons. This is the

season in which we are called on to fling off the drapery of the world, to forget we are powerful, to forget we are young, to forget we are rich, to pass over all the scenes of life, till we get at the last, and to remember only, that we must die, and be judged by the Son of God. For the Sabbath is not only a day of rest to the body,

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but it is a day of refreshment to the mind. The spirit of it is not only to lift up the body, that is bowed down; but to purify the soul, that is spotted by the world. Thou shalt do no manner of work, thou shalt noto bes the slave of avarice, nor of ambition,}} nor of vanity, nor of pride; as your body t is cheered for the toils of the days that are to come, your soul shall be more estranged from the temptations of life, and better guarded against its perils.

To conclude; one of the main pillars on which religion, and consequently our temporal, and eternal happiness rests, is the conservation of the Sabbath; against this, the natural course of human vices, and the designed attacks of profligate innovators, will be powerfully directed; here the best interests of mankind are to be defended by vigilance, by strong unsophisticated sense, and by a decided disregard of that ridicule, that would throw an air of rusticity, inelegance, and even of bigotry, over these institutions, of themselves solemn, and affecting; but from what they protect inestimable. If ever we live to see the Sabbath

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