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tares to be burnt upon the earth. Consider, I intreat you, how have the soils of your hearts been plowed-how have they been cultivated? How does the seed come forth? Is the seed good and does it promise to be an abundant crop? Observant as you are of the seasons, accustomed to receive the rain and the sun here, let me ask you, have you ever prepared your hearts for the reception of the word of God? What would an unprepared field produce? What would the natural produce of the soil be worth? Wild oats produce a bad crop and give much trouble to the cultivator: so a wild uncultivated heart, left entirely to the dictates of nature, may here and there show a goodly plant, but so surrounded by weeds as to be worth nothing. Break up the soil, sow the good seed, and the fruits will be good. What should we say to a man who plowed up his lands carelessly and threw bad seed upon it? Could he expect to reap a good crop? It would be absurd to suppose that he could: it would be exactly as here contemplated-" They that plow iniquity, and sow wickedness, reap the same." "A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things" (Matt. ii. 35). As the heart is, so is the man. It is too generally observed in life, and evident in old age, that the plowing iniquity, and sowing wickedness, afford a melancholy harvest to the reaper.

God, the Lord our God, is at this time looking upon the harvest of the earth and ready to send forth His angel with this commission:-"Thrust in thy sickle and reap, for the time is come for thee to reap, for the harvest of the earth is ripe!" (Rev.

xiv. 15). What produce will you now yield? Is your heart set upon God-have you plowed righteously and sown love?-or plowed iniquity and sown wickedness? Oh, that God would break up the soil, that the good seed might come thereupon and produce fruit unto the everlasting harvest!

The harvest may be ripe with many of us: how is the produce? Good seed may have been sown: whence then has it tares? An enemy hath done this. Root out the tares and burn them, but the wheat gather into my garner.

Consider, I entreat you, the seasons that are gone. Seed-time is past with many of us and harvest is come: how long longer we may stand we know not. Soon must we fall beneath the sickle, and be gathered as shocks of corn into the garner. Oh, that I could persuade youth to prepare the heart by diligent prayer, careful examination, sincere repentance of the past, to plow the heart with righteousness, that the word of God may be sown thereupon! Oh, that our hearts may have been productive of good fruits-that we may all have so cultivated the word of God thereon as to let our lives be conspicuous for the fruits of faith.

If

Examine then yourselves-prove your own selves. your "hearts do not condemn you, you may have confidence with God:" but, if you have plowed iniquity-if your life has been one of neglectful idleness and you have not thought of the harvest to come-let me entreat you now to repent, to plow your heart with sorrow, to break it up with contrition! Would to God that some good plants may yet arise and produce the good fruits of the Spirit— love, joy, peace, gentleness, brotherly kindness, and

charity-instead of the fruits of the flesh which are the seeds of wickedness and full of all manner of mischief.

Oh, let us not be weary in well doing, for in due time we shall reap if we faint not. And may God grant, not only that our temporal harvest may be plentiful and that we may be thankful for the same, but that in His eternal harvest we may not be found wanting, but be ready to yield the fruits of righteousness to the glory of God our Saviour in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Believe me, your affectionate friend,

THE COMFORTER.

ADDRESS V.

ALMIGHTY FATHER, who chasteneth those whom thou lovest and correcteth those whom thou wouldst make happy, grant that in all afflictions of mind or body we may behold thy fatherly visitation and kiss the rod thou hast appointed, and bless the hand that gives the blow, for the sake of the glory of Jesus Christ our Lord, in whose name we pray, Our Father, &c.

Happy is the man whom God correcteth.-JOB v. 17.

MY DEAR FRIENDS-Happiness is variously considered by all men; yet we all are in the pursuit of it from the first day of our birth even unto the last of our life. Yes, God has so constituted the human mind as to make it always searching after happiness. "When I was a child (says the apostle) I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child" (1 Corinthians xiii. 11). Little things then attracted our attention: we looked for the happiness of bubbles, and found in the transient enjoyment momentary felicity. A good man, even in years of maturity, cannot fail to remember the Christian lessons of his youth; and, though the heart might be then but seemingly slightly affected, yet when God's grace brought his young frame to a bed of sickness he then thought thereupon and wept. "Happy is the man whom God correcteth."

In youth, when the restraints of parental authority appear so irksome to the restless, ambitious, or pleasure-seeking hours of life, that it seems to the impatient soul as if it would never attain manhood whilst those parental anxieties exist, how merciful is God that He does not cut short our existence, and cast us into the place of darkness, where there is nothing but weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth! How merciful is God when, by a salutary correction, He induces the young mind to reflect!

A severe lesson may be required; for the son who will not learn " piety at home, and to requite his parents"-who is filled with the great ideas of what is his due and is anxious to be freed from his restraint at home-will find sometimes, when too late, that he never enjoyed true freedom beyond that of the obedience of a son. Witness only that most pious lesson taught us by Christ Himself, who, though he were a Son yet learnt He obedience by the things which He suffered: witness His beautiful parable of the prodigal son, in which it was by a most merciful and severe correction that the thoughtless young man was brought to his senses. Happy, indeed, both father and son, that in this instance it was not too late: there was joy in the presence of the angels of God over this sincere penitent. A certain man had two sons: the younger, thinking he should never attain any happiness of life in manhood under his father's eye, impatient of control, tired of his parent's advice, and longing for that unrestrained freedom which his ideas of independence gave him, besought his father at once to give him the portion that might come to him, and let him go and seek his fortune away from him. His father

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