it were as easy to find a cure, as a cause; because our minds are unexercised, and our hearts are not overflowing with the recollections of benevolence gratified, and passion subdued; because we have not courage for the toil, which is to make the relaxation sweet, because the love of admiration governs us, because we know not that the very essence of pleasure is rarity, that it is impossible, from the very constitution of our nature, to preserve the keenness of first sensations, or to prevent that apathy into which the mind, jaded with constant enjoyment, perpetually subsides.-Let no one imagine that it is an easy thing to lay aside the habits of dissipation at will; a valuable and systematic employment of time is acquired with difficulty, and, to be acquired at all, should be soon began. An industrious manhood is rarely grafted on a youth of folly; but a youth of folly will still keep you young, though you have numbered many days; and a hoary head will surprise you in the midst of youthful gratification, and frivolous amusement; yet, there is a time, when retirement is comely, and decent; at which, not only the dictates of

reason, and religion, but even the opinions of the world require it; there is a time, when you should carry grey hairs, and paleness, and weakness, into the midst of those, whose love will support your declining years, when you should grow old, and die in the bosom of your family; when you should spare to your fellow creatures the melancholy spectacle of irreverent old age, of levity without joy, of infirmity without wisdom: blessed is the hoary head, which is found in the paths of wisdom; but no blessings fall on him, who has grown old, without growing wise, and has gathered nothing from the lapse of years, but the outward symbols of decay.

One of the most obvious consequences of dissipation, is the destruction of all the mental powers. In men, upon whom the greater part of the business of the world, and the advancement of knowledge principally depend, this evil is the most inexcusable; there is no character which insures disrespect so much as that of a trifling, frivolous man; he is measured by the mag nitude of those objects which form the laudable pursuits of his sex; we cannot for

get the height of science, to which he might have ascended; the useful functions he might have fulfilled; the career of glory he might have run: the religious wisdom he might have treasured up. He has no excuse in a natural indelible mildness of character, which may betray the firmness of resolution, and communicate a greater force to the social feelings; he sins against the most exalted, and popular qualities of a man, without gaining any others in return; he is trifling, without being amiable; weak without being delicate; and ignorant without being affectionate, or humane. Neither let any shelter themselves under the plea, that dissipation does not sacrifice' that time which ought to be given up to more important occupations, religion bids us all prepare for an hereafter; benevolence bids us alleviate the miseries of the present scene, Knowledge invites us to contemplate, and understand it: the first, hallows the mind, the next, softens it, the last, strengthens, exalts, and adorns it. To love religion, is to love eternity,' and to love salvation; but to love knowledge, as a means of complying with the injunctions of that religion,.

may not be sufficiently impressed upon the minds of us all. In an advanced period of society, it is the most effectual preventative against the perils of idle opulence; it economizes the most useful possessions of a state, its talents; prevents the mournful waste of genius, and turns the powers of our minds into the real channels in which they ought to flow. Against the fair, and moderate pursuit of pleasure, I hope no one imagines me so mistaken as to contend, the love of knowledge will render the extravagant, and dissipated pursuit of it as distasteful as it is pernicious; nothing frees a man so effectually from the shameful dependance on foreign aid, and renders him so contented with himself, and his own home; he is no longer compelled to flee from the restless activity of the mind, to a circle of melancholy, and insipid amusement: This is not all; to exercise the mind is a duty, it is an essential part of righteousness; the agency upon the world, the power of doing good, increases immensely with the increase of our intellectual powers: It matters not by what science, by what studies our minds are exercised, if they be ready to be turned on

the conduct of life, the interests of mankind, and the promotion, and defence of religion; take, for instance, the task of early education commonly devolved upon mothers; is there one of greater importance in the whole circle of human affairs? and what daily ravages are committed on the characters of future men, by affectionate parents, who mean to do well without any adequate power of seconding their good intentions, and who lament, when too late, that they wasted in dissipation the season of improvement, that their minds have never been strengthened by difficulties, or fertilized by thought.

Dissipation is not less injurious to the qualities of the heart, than to the powers of the mind:-The dissipated become impatient of any thing which is not immediately amusing, they cannot submit to the present sacrifice which virtue requires, or wait for the remote gratifications which it affords: The passing moment must yield its tribute of pleasure at every expence of health, fortune, and inward satisfaction :All controul over inclination is gradually