so many whose characters are adorned with the graces of religion, die hidden in the obscurity of their station. But you occupy an eminence, and though you may wish to suppress the fact of your conversion, till you have ascertained its reality, yet if in the cleft of the rock you commune with the Holy One, the celestial influence shining on your countenance and imbuing your spirit, will betray the secret.

One of the first signs will be the choice of your society. To associate with those who spend their time in trifling amusements, or in paying and receiving fashionable visits, would afford you no real enjoyment. The subjects of conversation which usually engross the attention of persons of this description, would excite your disgust rather than awaken any strong mental interest. You would feel in their company, as a stranger feels in a strange land, restless and dissatisfied, because amongst a strange people. To you the house of prayer would present morę attractions than the ball-room, and to hold fel lowship with those whose fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ, you would cheerfully retire from the gayest circle that the genius of fashion ever formed.

To remain neutral in the great cause which

divides the affections and interests of mẹn, and which as with a prophetic seal marks their final destiny, will appear on reflection highly criminal. From an aversion to meet the public eye, or a secret dread of becoming "a cast-away," you may for a season hesitate to make an open profession of your attachment to the Redeemer, but this hesitancy must not continue the permanent feeling of your mind. You must respect those obligations which rise out of your new state. What are they? To identify your name, your influence, your wealth, your example, with the cause of the Redeemer; esteeming it a greater honour than to stand in visible alliance with coronets or mitres, sceptres or crowns.

The too general practice of the young in absenting themselves from the ordinance of the Lord's Supper must be avoided by you. The participation of this ordinance, we admit, is not essential to salvation; but if you uniformly neglect it, you withhold from the Church and from the Saviour one proof of your attachment to him. "If you love me, keep my commandments;" and does he not, pointing to his disciples, when commemorating his dying love, thus address you, "This do in remembrance of me?" and will you retire at the close of the

service, with "the mixed multitude," virtually proclaiming as you pass the table, that you have no inheritance in the Son of Jesse ?

"All things are ready; come away,
Nor weak excuses frame :

Press to your station at the feast,

And bless the Founder's name."

As a city set

Your gay ad

Such a course of decided piety will make you conspicuous in proportion to the splendour of your accomplishments, and the elevation of your rank. To compare you to the glow-worm which emits a feeble though distinct light, beneath some obscure shade, would be improper; "You are the light of the world. on a hill, you cannot be hid." quaintance, ignorant of the peace which you en-: joy, will conclude, that fixed melancholy must be the inevitable consequence of your singular preference and decision. On you the refutation of this general yet mistaken opinion will devolve. Whilst in your occasional intercourse with them you avoid that levity which wounds the delicate feelings of undissembled piety, and that moroseness which sits brooding on the countenance of a disappointed miad; display an animated yet sedate cheerfulness, which will ennoble your

character in their estimation and convince them that

"Religion never was design'd

To make our pleasures less."

By entering too ardently into the peculiar forms and modes, and sentiments of a party, by adopting too rigidly their phraseology, by resting satisfied with their circumscribed views, many females have injured their dispositions, tinged their characters with the dark shades of human infirmities, and contracted the range of their moral influence. cautiously resist.

This propensity you should

To continue unsettled in

opinion, even on the minor differences which divide the professing world, would be improper; but to invest those differences with that importance, to give to them that ardour of attachment, that prominence in discussion, which belongs exclusively to the essential truths of Revelation, would be to display a mean and bigotted spirit; and the injury which your devotional habits would sustain, would be a sacrifice for which no triumph of party feelings could compensate. When associating with those of different communión, to make either a covert or direct attack on their peculiarities of sentiment, would be to sound the trumpet of contest, and you might

mutually retire irritated and wounded, to deplore in secret the imperfections, to which your nature is subject.

No virtue sheds so much lustre on the character of a Christian as humility, yet perhaps no virtue is more misunderstood. The affected gravity which some occasionally assume, and the strong expressions which they use when speaking of their defects, must excite disgust and abhorrence in a mind imbued with the pure genius of the Gospel. The character of this humility, on inspection, is easily detected. It is generally supported by a spirit which is impatient of the slightest contradiction; and if you could penetrate the secret recess of its existence, you would see it writhing with anguish, when that admiration and applause are withheld on which its vitality and energy depend.

This quality of the Christian character, which cóntracts or expands according to the temperature of the mind, is uniformly attended by extensive and impressive views of the evil of sin, and of the numerous imperfections which are dieplayed in all our spiritual exercises and relative engagements. Her language in the closet is on record: "Woe is me, for I am undone, for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of