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complete within itself, not as the rushing current of the river that hastens towards the distant

ocean.

And hence the perplexity, and perhaps the scorn, which this subject of devotional exercises must produce in every mind in which those higher sentiments and totally un-selfish feelings have been checked, or have been wounded and destroyed, by intercourse with an unfeeling world. The noblest states of the Pious mind are those, not of intellect, nor of passion, but of quiet love; and what wonder, therefore, if the dry abstract reasoner, who lives in the region of mere words, or the selfish worldling who knows of no emotions but those of hope and fear, advantage or disadvantage, should look upon the feelings of devotion as the effusions only of diseased imagination, and the fantasies of enthusiasm. By the spiritual taste alone can the things of the spirit be appreciated. The sweetest harmony does but jar upon the ear of him who has no music in his soul. The loveliest works of nature, or of art, have no attraction but to the eye of Taste. The grandest bursts of poetry or eloquence possess no charm but for the mind of genius. The purest affections of friendship and love are unknown, nay inconceivable, to the sensual and sordid heart. But just in the sphere of all these higher states of mind does Piety lie, and Devotion exer

cise itself. For Piety is, not indeed mere Taste nor Admiration, nor Affection, — but it is the experience of these feelings in relation to God—it is the co-presence of His idea amidst them all, as the Being in whom alone they find their full enjoyment. And only therefore, by reference to these feelings in their lower exercise, can we illustrate what we mean by Piety, and by Devotion which is the breath of Piety, towards God. "Would you know what the affections are," it has been beautifully said, "ask your heart when, sad or glad, it is touched by thoughts of father, mother, brother, sister, friend, and in its sadness or gladness still feels a serenity as if belonging to the untroubled regions of the skies. Fancy comes and goes like the rainbow— passion like the storm-transiently beautifying or subliming the clouds of life. But affection is a permanent light, without distinction of night and day, which once risen never sets, and always, in mild meridian,

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Seeming immortal in its depth of rest.”

And to this " depth of rest" the Christian mind attains by all those exercises of devotion which bring God present to the consciousness and inweave his Idea with all we see, and all we read of, and all we share in with our fellow-men-by MEDITATION on God's works and ways-by STUDY of his Truth, -by COMMUNION with his people.

SECTION I.

DEVOTIONAL MEDITATION.

MEDITATION, not merely as a stated exercise, but as a devout habit of connecting the Idea of God with all we see around us, is a most important means of nourishing the Spiritual life. Isaac exercised it when he "went out to meditate in the field, at even-tide." David, when he "considered the heavens, the work of God's fingers, the moon and the stars which he had ordained;" and again, when he exclaimed "I remember the days of old, I meditate on all thy works; I muse on the works of thy hands." John, when he was "in the Spirit on the Lord's day." And Paul, when in holy musing he was carried out of himself, and " caught up to the third heaven."

Which meditative habit will find its food and stimulant in Contemplation of the works and ways of God. For in those works and ways he manifests himself, and by them is he understood. Observation and reflection must furnish the occasions of Devotion. Thought must precede feeling, though feeling is much more than thought. For genuine,

mental feeling, is nothing but a certain state and relation of the thoughts. And hence its permanence when the fire of animal life is gone. Hereby it becomes part of the soul itself and partaker of its immortality. States of sensation become. more feeble at every repetition, because they result from the excitement of animal powers which are perishable. But states of mental feelingtaste, affection, sentiment, are strengthened and matured by exercise, because they rise from, and, are re-produced by thoughts, which are enduring. Not the most novel, but the most familiar, scenery; not the most strange but the best known, melodies; not the newest but the oldest friends; not the most startling, but the most intimate and inborn truths ; are those which most delight the mind.

And therefore by frequent contemplation of those works and ways of God, which repeat and reflect upon us from every side his great Idea, must we make the feeling of his presence intimate and familiar. In all places of his dominion He is present. Heaven and earth are full of his glory. And, therefore, in all places of his dominion, will the meditative spirit recognize his presence and adore his glory. The foundation of all true Religion is the grand truth of the Unity of God of the universal agency of one and the same great Being in all events and things. And this unity is

not practically realized but in proportion as we see God in all things and all things in God. "He only," says Bishop Taylor, " to whom all things are One, who draweth all things to One, and seeth all things in One, may enjoy true peace and rest of spirit."* Whenever we contemplate powers at work in Nature, or in Providence, or in Grace, which we neglect to refer up to the One undivided source of life, we are resting in something below God, and breaking into fragments his Unity. Nay, when we contemplate God too distinctly under different aspects, as sometimes the God of Nature, and sometimes of Providence, and sometimes of Grace, we are going far to make this same most dangerous separation, and to set in opposition in our minds the various attributes and workings of the single One.t Who does not feel that men have spoken and written as if the Jehovah of the Jews had abandoned all the rest of the world to meaner hands and as if the miserable heathen were not only "without God" through the blindness of their own heart, but without his sovereign rule and

* Which sentence is borrowed from Thomas à Kempis:"Cui omnia unum sunt, et omnia ad unum trahit, et omnia in uno videt; potest stabilis corde esse, et in Deo pacificus manere.” De imit. Christi. I. iii.

It is a dull and obtuse mind that must divide in order to distinguish. And in such we may contemplate the source of superstition and idolatry. COLERIDGE,

Q

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