cause ye have overcome the wicked one"; and again, "I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one."

This apostolical example we would follow; this Scriptural authority we would use. I desire to address the young men of this society, and all those who are willing to hear me, in the words of soberness and truth. Under different circumstances and with a feebler tongue; but with a purpose I trust equally true, and with a work to be accomplished, not less important than that which the Apostles themselves were sent to accomplish. For their work was to speak in Christ's stead, persuading men to be reconciled to God; and the same work is committed to every minister of Christ, at the present day. They may do it badly; they may work as hirelings, and not as faithful shepherds; but their work, whether done or neglected, is the same.

The circumstances, however, under which the Apostle spoke are very different from our own. He addressed those only who were members of the Church of Christ, who had already made a good profession and proved their sincerity by lives of obedience. For he says, "I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong"; that is, strong in the Lord and in the power of his might, "and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one." In that day there were very few nominal Christians. Those who bore the name of Christ were also compelled to bear his cross. They who came to hear Christian preaching carried their lives in their hands, and the young men of a Christian society were an army of self-devoted followers of Him, under whose standard they were enlisted. I wish that it were so now. The outward danger is past, but I wish that the selfdevotion could continue.

Unhappily for the Christian cause, it is not so. Of all the young men in this city, who were educated by Christian parents, and who in common language would call themselves Christians, not one tenth have a full right to that name; not one tenth have so much as professed their faith in Christ. How small a number can be said to have a well-founded hope in him! In this society, there are probably two or three hundred young men; I mean that there is at least that number who make this their usual place of worship, when they attend church at all. How small a part of them take their place at the communion-table of Christ! or, to apply a more general test, how small a part of them can be said to have had a personal religious experience!

The majority of young men are unfixed in their religious opinions, irresolute in their religious purposes, irregular in their religious duties. Many of them are unsettled in their principles of conduct and have no fixed plan of life. They are floating upon the surface of society, carried one way or the other by the currents of social influence, by the changing wind of good or ill success. They are not strong; the word of God does not yet abide in them; they have not overcome the wicked one. They are trusting, it would seem, to the natural progress of things for their salvation, instead of working it out with fear and trembling.

Young men! I speak seriously and earnest ly, but do I not speak truly? I would not bring an unjust charge, but I fear that there is something radically wrong, which needs to be corrected. The wrong may be in the speaker, more than the hearer; in the minister, more than in the people; for surely if religion were presented, as it ought to be, in its simplicity and power, there would not be so many of the young who turn away from it, with indifference or contempt. Our churches ought to be filled with young men. Our communion-table should be crowded with them; our Sunday school, our ministry to the poor, our Christian missions, and every religious enterprise, should be made prosperous by their coöperation; and this would be the case, if the Gospel of Christ were brought home to their hearts as it ought to be. That it is not done, is undoubtedly the fault of those to whom the dispensation of the Gospel is committed. If the truth could be preached as it is in Jesus, surely the young would hear it. Would to God that I could now speak so that every one who hears me would feel rebuked for his sinfulness, and go from this house with his heart full of that infinite question, "What shall I do to be saved?"

success.

This is my reason for speaking so plainly; for in plainness of speech is my only hope of This is the cause of my anxiety; for while there are so many young men who show their confidence in me by making this the place of their worship, but to whom it is not made the savor of life unto life, there is reason to fear that my own duty is but imperfectly performed.

Do not understand me, however, as saying or thinking that the salvation of my hearers depends upon me. I abhor that arrogance of the priestly office, by which such claims are made, as though the minister, the servant of Christ, were the mediator between God and man. Nor can we excuse the worldly-minded and indifferent, as though they could plead, before the bar of God, the dulness or ineffi