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DEVOTION.

S the lively exercise of those affections, which we owe to the Supreme Being. It comprehends feveral emotions of the heart which terminate in the fame object. The chief of them are veneration, gratitude, defire, and refignation.

It implies firft, profound veneration for God, that is, an affection compounded of awe and love; -secondly, fincere gratitude for all his benefits: this is a warmer emotion than veneration; veneration looks up to the Deity as he is himfelf; gratitude regards what he is towards us ;---thirdly, the defire of the foul after the favour of the Supreme Being, as its chief good and final rest ;--and, fourthly, it advances to an entire refignation of the foul to God. It is the confummation of trust and hope. It banishes anxious cares and murmuring thoughts. It reconciles us to every appointment of Divine Providence; and refolves every wish into the defire of pleafing him, whom our hearts adore.

It is one of the nobleft acts of which the human mind is capable. It is a powerful principle which penetrates the foul, which purifies the affections

fections from debafing attachments; and, by a fixed and steady regard to God, fubdues every finful paffion, and forms the inclinations to piety and virtue.

It expreffes the spirit which muft animate all religious duties. It ftands oppofed not merely to downright vice; but to a heart which is cold and infenfible to facred things, and obeys the divine commands without ardour, love, and joy. It is rational and well-founded. It is of the highest importance to every other part of religion and virtue; and, in fine, is the most conducive to our happiness. It diffufes an aufpicious influence over the whole of virtue. It is often found a powerful inftrument in humanizing the manners of men, and taming their unruly paffions. It smooths what is rough, and foftens what is fierce in our nature. It is the great purifier of the affections. It infpires contempt of the low gratifications belonging to animal life. It promotes a humble and cheerful contentment with our lot, and fubdues the eager defire of riches and of power, which has filled this unhappy world with crimes and mifery. The fpirit of devotion is the gift of God. From his infpiration it proceeds; towards him it tends; ard in his prefence hereafter, it fhall attain its full perfection.

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MORALITY AND DEVOTION SEPARATELY INSUFFICIENT.

THE

HE man of mere morality is a stranger to all the delicate and refined pleasures of devotion. In works of beneficence and mercy he may enjoy fatisfaction; but it will be deftitute of that glow of affection, which enlivens the feelings of one, who lifts his heart at the fame time to the Father of the univerfe, and confiders himself as imitating God.

The man again who refts folely on devotion, if that devotion opens not his heart to humanity, not only remains a stranger to the pleasures of beneficence, but must often undergo the pain arifing from bad paffions.

IN

DISCONTENT.

N the humble and feemingly quiet fhade of private life, as well as among the great and mighty, difcontent broods over its imaginary forrows; preys upon the citizen no lefs than the courtier, and often nourishes paffions equally maglignant in the cottage and in the palace. Hav

ing once feized the mind, it fpreads its own gloom over every furrounding object; it every where searches out materials for itself; and in no direction more frequently employs its unhappy activity, than in creating divifions among mankind, and in magnifying flight provocations into mortal injuries.

In fituations where much comfort might be enjoyed, this man's fuperiority and that man's neglect, our jealousy of a friend, our hatred of a rival, an imagined affront, or a mistaken point of honour, allow us no repofe. Hence difcord in families, animofities among friends, and wars among nations! Look around us! every where we find a bufy multitude. Restless and uneafy in their present fituation, they are inceffantly employed in accomplishing a change of it; and as foon as their wish is fulfilled, we difcern by their behaviour, that they are as diffatisfied as they were before. Where they expected to have found a paradife, they find a defert.

The man of business pines for leifure; the leifure for which he had longed proves an irksome gloom, and through want of employment, he languishes, fickens, and dies.

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The man of retirement fancies no ftate fo happy as that of active life; but he has not engaged long in the tumults and contefts of the world, until he finds cause to look back with regret on the calm hours of his former privacy and retreat.

Beauty, wit, eloquence, and fame, are eagerly defired by perfons in every rank of life. They are the parent's fondest wifh for his child; the ambition of the young, and the admiration of the old; and yet in what numberless instances have they proved, to thofe who poffeffed them, no other than shining fnares, feductions to vice, inftigations to folly, and, in the end, fources of mifery.

THE

DISSIPATION.

HE love of diffipation is allowed to be the reigning evil of the prefent day. It is an evil which many content themfelves with regretting, without feeking to redrefs.

It is too often cultivated as the readieft relief to domeftic infelicity; it draws the mind awhile from the fubject of its diftrefs, and fuffers it to

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