humble themselves in the presence of Indian traders. All the crimes against property known to our laws flourish with unnatural vigor; and some, unknown to civilized villany. To swindle ignorance, to over-reach simplicity, to lie without scruple to any extent, from mere implication down to perjury; to tempt the savages to rob each other, and to receive their plunder; to sell goods at incredible prices to the sober Indian, then to intoxicate him, and steal them all back by a sham bargain, to be sold again, and stolen again; to employ falsehood, lust, threats, whiskey, and even the knife and the pistol; in short to consume the Indian's substance by every vice and crime possible to an unprincipled heart inflamed with an insatiable rapacity, unwatched by Justice, and unrestrained by Law--this it is to be an INDIAN TRADER. I would rather inherit the bowels of Vesuvius, or make my bed in Etna, than own those estates which have been scalped off from human beings as the hunter strips a beaver of its fur. Of all these, of ALL who gain possessions by extortion and robbery, never let yourself be envious! I was envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. Their eyes stand out with fatness: they have more than heart could wish. They are corrupt, and speak wickedly concerning oppression. They have set their mouth against the heaven, and their tongue

walketh through the earth. When I sought to know this, it was too painful for me, until I went into the sanctuary. Surely thou didst set them in slippery places! thou castedst them down into destruction as in a moment! They are utterly consumed with terrors. As a dream when one awaketh, so, O Lord! when thou awakest, thou shalt despise their image!

I would not bear their heart who have so made money, were the world a solid globe of gold, and mine. I would not stand for them in the judgment, were every star of Heaven a realm of riches, and mine. I would not walk with them the burning marl of Hell, to bear their torment, and utter their groans, for the throne of God itself.

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Riches got by deceit, cheat no man so much as the getter. Riches bought with guile, God will pay for with vengeance. Riches got by fraud, are dug out of one's own heart, and destroy the mine. Unjust riches curse the owner in getting, in keeping, in transmitting. They curse his children in their father's memory, in their own wasteful habits, in drawing around them all bad men to be their companions.

While I do not discourage your search for wealth, I warn you that it is not a cruise upon level seas, and under bland skies. You advance where ten

thousand are broken in pieces before they reach the mart; where those who reach it are worn out, by their labors, past enjoying their riches. You seek a land pleasant to the sight, but dangerous to the feet; a land of fragrant winds, which lull to security; of golden fruits, which are poisonous; of glorious hues, which dazzle and mislead.

You may be rich and be pure; but it will cost you a struggle. You may be rich and go to heaven; but ten, doubtless, will sink beneath their riches, where one breaks through them to Heaven. If you have entered this shining way, begin to look for snares and traps. Go not careless of your danger, and provoking it. See, on every side of you, how many there are who seal God's word with their blood:

They that will be rich, fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the LOVE of Money is the root of all evil, which, while some have coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sor

rows.

LECTURE IV.

My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not. Prov. i. 10.

HE who is allured to embrace evil under some engaging form of beauty, or seductive appearance of good, is enticed. A man is tempted to what he knows to be sinful; he is enticed where the evil appears to be innocent. The Enticer wins his way by bewildering the moral sense, setting false lights ahead of the imagination, painting disease with the hues of health, making impurity to glow like innocency, strewing the broad-road with flowers, lulling its travellers with soothing music, hiding all its chasms, covering its pitfalls, and closing its long perspective with the mimic glow of Paradise.

The young are seldom tempted to outright wickedness; evil comes to them as an enticement. The honest generosity and fresh heart of youth would revolt from open meanness and undisguised vice. + The Adversary conforms his wiles to their nature.

He tempts them to the basest deeds by beginning with innocent ones, gliding to more exceptionable, and finally, to positively wicked ones. All our warnings then must be against the vernal beauty of vice. Its autumn and winter none wish. It is my purpose to describe the enticement of particular men upon the young. +

Every youth knows that there are dangerous men abroad who would injure him by lying, by slander, by over-reaching and plundering him. From such they have little to fear, because they are upon their guard. Few imagine that they have any thing to dread from those who have no designs against them; yet, such is the instinct of imitation, so insensibly does the example of men steal upon us and warp our conduct to their likeness, that the young often receive a deadly injury from men with whom they never spoke. As all bodies in nature give out or receive caloric until there is an equilibrium of temperature, so there is a radiation of character upon character. Our thoughts, our tastes, our emotions, our partialities, our prejudices, and finally, our conduct and habits, are insensibly changed by the silent influence of men who never once directly tempted us, or even knew the effect which they produced. I shall draw for your inspection some of those dangerous men, whose open or silent entice