heart is in another? But we need not enlarge on this point. All men see it, feel it, perfectly understand it. It is responded to from the breast of every living soul.

Now, our remark is this, that the principle is as true in its application to man's moral agency, as to his physical or intellectual. It is joy, for the most part, that makes men industrious and indefatigable in the fulfilment of moral claims and undertakings. This is the great principle of christian attainment; of holy zeal and enterprise in the people of God. Why should it not be so? Would it not be surprising and unaccountable to find it otherwise? Should we not ask with wonder, how is it that a principle which holds good in every other department of rational agency, should fail in this department? Are the laws of nature violated in the spiritual kingdom? No; reason requires us to believe that this is the very sphere, in which, above all others, the efficiency of this influence is discovered. The influence itself exists here in a far nobler kind, than any where else. The joy of the Lord is as far above all other kinds of joy, as holiness is better than other kinds of excellence. The just conclusion is, that the effects of this joy are proportionally superior; the conclusion of common sense, confirmed by the universal testimony of Scripture and experience. It may however be useful, to enter somewhat particularly, into an examination of the tendencies of this feeling; to inquire, in several instances, into the ways in which its efficacy is exerted and discovered.

We observe then, in the first place, that joy gives life and spirit to all the mental powers and operations. A delighted mind is full of brightness and alertness, finds action easy, has all its faculties at command, and exerts them with intensity of application. Under the vivifying effusions of joy, imagination awakes, perception becomes acute, the range of observation is enlarged, judgment is invigorated, memory is sharpened, taste refined, the whole soul, in short, is instinct with the spirit of intellectual life, and waits only for the orders of the will, to put forth its utmost energies, and to accomplish the highest results of which it is capable. And the will itself is in a great degree, influenced, if not determined by joy. It is when men have delight in the things about which their volitions and purposes are conversant, that they form bold and firm resolutions; then it is that they decide freely and promptly to enter upon courses of mental exertion, of which perhaps the thought would

not have occurred to them in the absence of joy. We offer no proof of what we now affirm, but make our appeal directly to human consciousness. No one who reflects on the history of his own mental states and operations can call it in question. Το every one the matter is as certain as consciousness itself. Nor is it inexplicable. Happiness is the ultimate end of rational being. All sentient being indeed, of whatever nature, languishes and pines when kept back from the final end of its existence; it is, on the other hand, in its state of greatest perfection, when it perfectly enjoys that end: It is so with the mind of man; joy is its ultimate end; in possession of that end, all its faculties are in their best condition. We only add, if other kinds of joy have an invigorating influence on the mind, much more must that incomparably higher joy of which we speak.

Again, as this feeling imparts such life to the mind itself, so does it brighten by this means, the objects of intellection. Its influence in this respect is sometimes as if a new sun had been created to irradiate the world in which mind moves. You yesterday read Milton with a wearied heart, and fell asleep over the sublime glories of his page; this morning you perused the same page with a spirit refreshed by sweet and sufficient sleep, and you were amazed and overpowered, by its wondrous creations of fancy and taste. The world of Faith, the world revealed in the gospel, a short time since, when you endeavored to think upon it, with a soul almost dead to spiritual excellence, was nearly as the region of emptiness and darkness; now, when the spirit of a revival sheds its life through your bosom, that world of invisible glory eclipses the world of sense, and absorbs the powers and sensibilities of your being. What was the Holy One to you, some weeks ago, when you pretended to worship Him, with a dull and worldly heart; what is He now, when a joyful sense of his excellency draws from your breast the ardent exhortation to those who know nothing of your blessedness, to taste and see that the Lord is good? What a difference in the character of the Saviour at present, from what he seemed to you then? The whole Bible, the whole subject of religion how immensely different. Yet the whole of this difference is the result of spiritual delight in your own mind. The joy of the Lord then, is it not your strength? If you had an angel's powers, what could you do, with no distinct views of the objects with which those powers are conversant?

Attend, next, for a moment, to the influence of spiritual plea

you

sure on the performance of devotional exercises. Who is it that has grown weary of his closet, his Bible, his domestic altar, the meeting for prayer, and the solemn services of the Sabbath? Could you inspect the heart of such a person, is it probable that would find it the abode of much religious enjoyment? Do you think it would be possible to discover any thing in such a man's heart, to justify his saying with the spiritually minded Psalmist, one day in the courts of the Lord is better than a thousand? No one I am sure could believe it possible. A deserter from the throne of grace, a neglecter of devotional duties, is one who takes little or no delight in the performance of those duties. To him who has heavenly joy springing up in his mind, the sanctuary, the place of social prayer, the closet, the solitary walk, will be the gate of heaven. Such a man will be inclined to pray, not merely thrice, nor even seven times a day, but to be praying always, with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit; to dwell in the secret place of the Most High, to abide in the tabernacle of the Almighty continually. The spirit of devotion never tires, while the joy of the Lord is its prompter. Day and night, it can continue its aspirations and outpourings of affection. It has no content in shortness, in interruption, in lifeless exercises. No, the joy of the Lord lifts the heart up to heaven, and keeps it there, communing with holy angels, with the church of the first born, with the spirits of just men made perfect, with God the Judge of all, with Jesus the Mediator, and with his most precious blood of sprinkling.

We will now advert, in few words, to the influence of this grace on other gracious states of mind. We refer not to the indirect influence which it exerts upon them, by promoting the mind's spiritual intercourse with their objects; by inclining it to heavenly meditation and prayer; but to a direct and necessary connexion between this and other holy feelings. All the gracious affections, being of the same family and intimately allied to each other, exert a reciprocal influence on one another, promotive of each other's strength and growth; but there appears to be a preeminence in the friendly power of joy upon its sister graces. The reason seems to be, that joy, being the end of all the heavenly affections, when this feeling connects itself with them, they must of course be more vigorous than in any other circumstances. Let us illustrate in a few instances. Love often exists apart from joy, but it seldom flourishes apart from It is when the heart finds delight in loving, that it loves

it.

with great intensity and enlargement. Then it is that it gives itself away to the beloved object, and as it were loses itself in it. Hope too is fed by joy; joy, in this world, being the earnest and foretaste of the object of hope. The full assurance of hope is always the effect of joy reigning in the soul; it can come from nothing else; no external evidence can produce it; it cannot be gained from inference, or any witness without; no, it is the beginning of heaven, the peace of God which passeth all understanding, this it is, that displaces every doubt in the soul, and fills the mind with certainty respecting its eternal blessedness; joy does it, and nothing else can. Faith likewise rises. and approximates to vision, when joy gives it wings; for when the things believed are at the same time rejoiced in, how can it be otherwise than that faith in the reality of those things should amount to the utmost confidence and boldness? How also does the relenting of the heart in view of sin and the mercy of God abound, when the soul turns her eye to these objects, after being melted into tenderness and sweetness, by a rejoicing sense of the beauty of holiness? We could add to these instances, if it were necessary; but they are sufficient. It is exceedingly manifest, that it must give zest and strength to every good feeling of which the mind is capable, to have that feeling attended with conscious delight, and such delight too as the joy of the Lord, the very joy of the supreme and blessed God.

Let us next notice how nobly this feeling of spiritual delight can bear up the mind amidst assaults of outward affliction. Through these assaults must all make their triumphant way, who at last gain entrance into the world of rest. As many as 1 love, I rebuke and chasten. I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction. Here it is that strength is demanded, and what in these circumstances imparts strength like this holy joy? Hope and faith are indeed needful, but it is joy commonly which gives faith and hope their strength. Unattended by joy, they may stay up the mind in some sort, amidst these seasons of storm and darkness; they may keep it from sinking into the deep waters of despair, but they may not do even this without a great inward strife. Many a saint going through the floods of trouble in the mere exercise of hope and faith, has meanwhile trembled in himself, lest by failing to retain these supporters, he should perish in the passage. But how is the scene changed at once, when the light of heavenly joy springs up in darkness? What can any floods or fires of tribulation then do, to hinder the mind's

steadfastness, and swift progress in its upward course to God? These trials seem to assist rather than hinder it on its way. How matchless the efficacy of this divine joy! It enlivens faith and hope, and all the other heavenly affections. It is as if omnipotence itself had entered into all the feelings of the mind. The mind becomes more than a conqueror. The very violence of fire is quenched; and sometimes, as in the case of the martyr, the fiercest flames under the mighty influences of spiritual joy, not only lose their peculiar power, but become an instrument of ease, as the dying martyr found the flames were to him a bed of roses. This may savor of mere ardor to the externally strict religionist, but he is not set to judge in this case: we appeal in verification of what we have said to the Scriptures of truth, and the history of the church. It has been fulfilled in thousands of real examples of whom the world was not worthy.

The power of this feeling, as evinced in its resistance to the influence of worldly good, is a further commendation of it. It is this influence, far more than that of outward affliction, that tries and ensnares the spirit of man. Indeed, what is it that constitutes the bitterness of affliction, but its abridging or destroying our enjoyment of the world? Were we wholly dead to worldly good, small would be the power of affliction to disturb us. It is then the world's influence that forms our grand incumbrance. Here is the great adversary of our souls. Here is what gives all other temptations their strength. It is this which gives the great destroyer himself all the advantage he has against us; which enables him to reach our spirits, with his wiles and darts of perdition; and which makes us his willing captives and vassals. What then can most effectually secure us against the encroachment and tyranny of this present evil world? Whatever that is, it is more to be desired than all things in the universe besides; he who has it, would be a madman to part with it for the treasures of creation.

What then is this priceless treasure? It is unquestionably a happiness higher than that which the world has to offer. The human mind, by the nature God has given it, evermore seeks enjoyment. Since its sad perversion, by the original apostasy, it looks for enjoyment to the visible and outward world. That world besets it, with its ensnaring temptations, at the commencement of its existence, and works in it, the fatal delusion that in worldly good lies the supreme blessedness. This gross delusion, the grand difficulty to be overcome in recovering the mind