NOVEMBER, 1852.

RELIGIOUS DISCIPLINE OF LIFE.

Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life" (Proverbs iv. 23.) "KEEPING the heart" implies, first, a careful guard over the thoughts. It is in the heedless disregard of the thoughts that corruption often takes its rise. They are suffered to wander without restraint to attach themselves without check to any objects which attract the senses, or are suggested in conversation --and to rove uncontrolled from one end of the world to another. How many hours are thus wasted in unprofitable musing, which leaves no impression behind! How much of life is made an absolute blank! Worse still, how often do sinful fancies, sensual images, unlawful desires, take advantage of this negligence to insinuate themselves into the mind, and make to themselves a home there, polluting the chambers of the soul, and rendering purity unwelcome! This is the beginning of evil with many a one who, from this want of vigilance over the course of his thoughts, has surrendered himself to frivolity and sensuality, without being aware that he was in peril. Thoughtlessness, mere thoughtlessness, prevents the detection of the intruder.

it.

You may fancy that your present preference for profitable subjects of thought is such, that you are in no danger from this source. But beware of trusting to any present disposition. If you become confident, you will fall; and the rather, because the beginning of this peril is so subtle and sly. Believe that the danger is real and imminent, or it is scarcely possible that you should not suffer from You may not, indeed, fall a victim to irregular desires and hurtful immoralities; but the habit of unwatched thought will weaken your control over your mind, will diminish your power of self-government, and rob you of that vigorous self-possession, alive to every occasion and prompt to every call, which forms the decision of character that ought to belong to him who professes to follow the energetic principles of Christian morality. So that, if you would be saved from an unbecoming weakness of mind - and its possible, not to say probable, consequences-keep a guard upon your thoughts. Let your morning and your evening prayer be, that you may live thoughtfully. Inquire frequently how they are engaged. Direct them to useful and innocent subjects. Think over the books you have been reading - rehearse to yourself the knowledge you have gained-call up the sermons you have heard —repeat the passages of Scripture you know. By methods like these, take care that even your empty hours minister to your improvement. Paley truly observed, that every man has some favorite subject, to which his mind spontaneously turns at every interval of leisure, and that with the devout man the subject is God. Hence the watching over your thoughts furnishes you with a ready test of your religious condition: it exposes to you the first and faintest symptoms of religious decline, and enables you to apply an immediate remedy.

If the thoughts, which may be expressed in words, are to be thus guarded, the temper and feelings, which are often indefinable in language, require a no less anxious guardianship. In the perplexities and trials of a daily life—in the conflict with the various tempers and frequently perverse dispositions of those around us—in the little crosses, the petty disappointments, the trifling ills which are our perpetual lot, we are exposed to lose that calm equanimity of mind which the Christian should habitually possess. We are liable to be ruffled and irritated, and to feel and display another spirit than the gentleness which "bears all things and is not easily provoked." The selfishness of some, the obstinacy

of others, the pride of our neighbor, the heedlessness of our children, and the unfaithfulness of our dependants, tire our patience, and disturb our self-possession; while bodily infirmity and disordered nerve magnify insignificant inconveniences into serious evils, and irritate to peevishness and discontent the temper which duty calls to cheerfulness and submission. Some are blessed with a native quietness of temperament which hardly feels the hourly vexations. But of some they form the great trial and peculiar cross-they can bear any thing better. And to all persons they constitute an exposure, full of hazard, and demanding cautious vigilance. The very spirit and essential traits of the Christian character require watchfulness against them, and imply conquest over them. The humility, meekness, forbearance, gentleness, and love of peace; the long-suffering, the patience, the serenity which form so lovely a combination, which pourtray a character that no one can fail to admire and love-these are to be maintained only by much and persevering watchfulness.

Without this the most equitable disposition by nature may become irritable and unhappy. With it, under the authority and guidance of Christian faith, the most unfortunate natural temper is subdued into the tenderness of the lamb. Without it the internal condition of man is restless, rebellious, full of wretchedness; having no peace in itself, and enjoying nothing around. With it the aspect of the world becomes changed — every thing is bearable, if not pleasant — the sweet light which beams within shines on all without, making pleasant the aspect of all men, and smoothing the roughness of all affairs. Who does not know how much the events of life take their hue from the state of the disposition? To the proud, suspicious, and jealous, every man seems an intruder, every gesture an insult, and every event a cause of vexation and wrath. To the self-governed and amiable every thing is tolerable, and he feels nothing of the inconveniences which make the misery of the other. One's happiness, therefore, as well as duty, require this control of the disposition. And when the Saviour pronounced his benediction on the pure, peaceful, humble-minded, and meek, he taught not only the great and requisite of his spiritual kingdom, but the great secret of human felicity.

When the frame of your mind is thus a constant care, you will find little difficulty in the control of the appetites. These things are connected together; and, an ascendancy over the former being secured, the subjection of the latter easily follows. But take good heed that it does not follow. Do not be thoughtless about it, because you fancy that it will of course accompany a regulated mind. Otherwise it is here that corruption may begin. The enemy will enter at any place, however improbable, which shall be left unguarded. And it only needs that the body become disordered, through the immoderate indulgence of the appetites, to raise a rebellion throughout the whole moral system; or to speak more plainly, this indulgence will create cloudliness of mind, indisposition of thought, activity, and duty, irritability of temper, sluggishness of devotional feeling, and at length a general spiritual lethargy. There can be little doubt, that much of our dulness of apprehension, and deadness of feeling on spiritual topics, as well as our strange sensibility to minor trials, is owing to a derangement of the animal economy, which is again owing to want of moderation in gratifying our animal desires. Hence there was some reason in the abstinence and fastings of religious men in ancient times; and if we valued superstitiously serenity and brightness of mind, an equal temper, and a perpetual aptitude for spiritual contemplation—we should imitate them more, if not in their fastings, yet certainly in their temperance. At any rate, let your moderation be known

unto all men. For temperance is not only the observance of an express injunction, but is essential to that quietness and self-control which should mark the religious character.

The next exercise of self-discipline will be in conversation. Conversation, while it is a chief source of improvement and pleasure, is also a scene of peculiar trial and the occasion of much sin. One might suppose that few persons ever dream that they are accountable for what passes in conversation, although there is no point of ordinary life which Jesus and the apostles have more frequently and sternly put under the control of religious principle. Their language is strikingly urgent on this head; and yet, so little scrupulousness is there among men, even religious men, that it would seem as if they felt ashamed to be careful in their talk. A thoroughly well governed speech is so rare that we still say, in the words of James, "If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man." Do not allow yourself to be off your guard in this respect. Make it a part of your business, by a cautious prudence, to have your speech consistent with the rest of your character. Do not flatter yourself that your thoughts are under due control, your desires properly regulated, or your dispositions subject, as they should be, to Christian principle, if your intercourse with others consists mainly of frivolous gossip, impertinent anecdotes, speculations on the characters and affairs of your neighbors, the repetition of former conversations, or a discussion of the current petty scandal of society; much less, if you allow yourself in careless exaggeration on all these points, and that grievous inattention to exact truth which is apt to attend the statements of those whose conversation is made up of these materials. Give no countenance to this lamentable departure from charity and veracity, which, it is mortifying to observe, commonly marks the every-day gossip of the world. Let precision in every statement distinguish what you say, and remembering that a little lie, or a little uncharitableness, is no better than a little theft. Be slow to speak those reports to another's disadvantage, which find so ready a circulation and are so eagerly believed, though every day's experience shows us that a large portion of them are unfounded and false. In a word, be convinced that levity, uncharitableness, and falsehood, are as truly immoral and irreligious in the common intercourse of life, as on its more solemn occasions-that idle and injurious words make a part of man's responsible character as really as blasphemy and idolatry — and that "if any man seem to be religious and bridle not his tongue, that man's religion is vain."

"A word spoken in season, how good it is!" Why should you not do all in your power to elevate the tone of conversation, and render the intercourse of man with man more rational and profitable? Let your example of cheerful, innocent, blameless words, in which neither folly nor austerity shall find place, exhibit the uprightness and purity of a mind controlled by habitual principle, and be a recommendation of the religion you profess. Let the authority of that faith to which you subject every other department of your character, be extended to those moments, not the least important, in which you exercise the peculiar capacity of a rational being in the interchange of thought. Never let it be said of your tongue, which Watts has truly called "the glory of our frame," that with it you bless God, and at the same time make its habitual carelessness a curse to men who are formed in the similitude of God.

The influence of the principle which rules within, should thus be seen in all your deportment and intercourse, on every occasion and in every relation. Your outward life should be but the manifestation and expression of the temper which prevails within, the acting-out of the sentiments which abide there; so that all