cradle-a manger, to his death-bed--a cross, led for us a life of privation and self-sacrifice, let us no longer delay to go after him— to leave all, and follow him. Yea, for our own sakes--as we love happiness, as we love life. For in him only can be found true happiness and life. It is by strength through him assured, and in him seen, that we can be delivered from the evils of the world and the evil of our own hearts. Never can we have inward peace and abiding rest and true enjoyment-it is one of the eternal impossibilities in God's universe-until our souls are purified from their sinful affections, and made to feel within them the smile of God's approval―are made one with him in will, in purpose, in desire; and never can this be our state but by living near to Jesus, by yielding our hearts unreservedly to the influences of his truth, and making him our pattern and guide. His salvation is not outward, but in the heart. In vain has Jesus been born into the world, if he be not born also in these inner worlds. "Christ in us the hope of glory." If we give not his truth a place in our souls-if we seek not to know its sanctifying and renewing influences, it might as well be hidden from us for aught it can do to help us spiritually. The outward and temporal benefits of Christianity we may enjoy-and they are great; but not, its spiritual and eternal.

"The babe of Bethlehem" is exalted now above the angels of heaven. But still does he regard us with love and compassion; still, as ever, does he desire our salvation. He calls us to follow his track upon the earth, and reign with him in happiness above. The manger-the cross--the crown: so does he call us to come after him-from humility, through self-denial, unto glory.

GREENWOOD'S SERMONS.*

SERMONS of a purely devotional cast, and especially those that are addressed to the afflicted, are perhaps the most difficult efforts in this most difficult kind of composition. Every religious dis

SERMONS OF CONSOLATION. By F. W. P. Greenwood, D. D., Minister of King's Chapel, Boston. Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown. 1842. pp. 335, 12mo.

course requires the exercise of the soul, as well as of the understanding. To fulfil the idea of what it should be, is a great achievement. To choose out its materials with wisdom and skill, to mould its expression into a becoming beauty, to inspire it with a sacred fervor, and to send it home to the conscience and heart of man, thoroughly fit for its benign but solemn errand, is more than is given to many to perform. To present the deepest moral truths, of whatever kind, in the most affecting manner,--to execute what after all must be a work of art so as to touch the highest springs of our nature,--to speak worthily of the sublimest themes without the least appearance of an unnatural straining,--to avoid all the common themes of the world's passion and business, and bring out the latent charm and glory of the subjects that every thoughtful mind revolves more than it discourses of,--to succeed in making the conceptions of faith appear in the full light of the dearest realities,―to write with the pen of the spirit,—all this is scarcely given to any one, however endowed, to perform always. But few attempts, out of a continual endeavor, will arrive at such perfection.

A sermon, as we apprehend, is a peculiar work, demanding a corresponding peculiarity of gifts and application. It is a species of writing standing sacredly by itself. It is an address like no other. Adapted rather to the receptive ear, into which it is intended to sink down, than to the criticising judgment, it seems to carry along with it the idea of the holy place in which it is delivered, of an audience of sympathizing minds, and the sanctity of divine traditions. It is no essay, no narrative, no disquisition, as such things are usually accounted. Still less does a collection of paragraphs, dealing but with the events of our perishable dwellingplace below, and kindled by the passionate interests of the hour, and employing the language of the market-place, deserve to take its name. Even when it is going through with its common ministrations, in its explanations of Scripture and its descriptions of the world, in what are called its doctrinal or practical forms, it is separated by a broad interval from every other class of literary compositions. It needs a new and diviner element, lifted above the earth, and purified from the wilfulness and folly that so easily cleave to us as the earth's children, to infuse into it its genuine character. Formal lessons do not greatly help it. There is a

secular air that, however easy and elegant, does not belong to it. Its tone should be "as becometh the oracles." Its imagery should be according to "the pattern" of holy writ. Hence it is, that the number of excellent discourses from the pulpit is no greater, and that they who distinguish themselves by other intellectual efforts often fail here; the task is so unique, the demand is made on such various powers, the standard is so high.

What has now been said of sermons in general will apply with special force to "sermons of consolation." As we began with saying, they are the hardest of all to write, at least in any considsiderable variety, with freshness and effect. They cannot spring from any set purpose of painting a touching scene, or making an impression. There must be nothing artificial about them. Nothing imitated ever so well, or repeated from the aptest memory, will do. They are an offering of love and sympathy. They must flow from the author's heart. They must be chiefly the expression of his devout sentiments. At the same time, they are not the mere effusions of his religious sensibility, but should show the training of a teacher. We desire to have them rich with intellectual cnlture, abounding with the fruits of long contemplation, and enlivened by a quick fancy. We reasonably expect from them, that while their style is simple it shall be attractive, and while their thoughts are obvious they shall not sound as absolutely old. He who applies himself to the office of a comforter cannot fall back upon his learning, nor exercise to advantage any metaphysical acuteness that he may possess. He will defeat his object, if he is too ambitious or too refined, and yet he is called upon to captivate the attention and satisfy the taste of a fastidious age.

In thus speaking, we have been giving one of the reasons why good sermons of this description are so rare. There are doubtless other causes; and among them this, that the occasional sermons of this class, though by no means most apt to be the preacher's best, are the most likely to find their way to the press. These, being of a local and personal character, are seldom calculated for any general effect; and their interest for the public, if they ever possessed it, rapidly diminishes as the occasion recedes that called them forth. There is undeniably a great want of able discourses in this delicate department of a minister's labors, that shall be suited for popular

and permanent use. Anxious and sorrowing hearts always abound hearts that seek for direction and solace from the gentle pages of Christian instruction. They often hear words from the pulpit, that meet their questions of difficulty and feelings of grief; for the preacher ascends into it not unfrequently from a round of sad duties, and speaks from the feelings they have inspired; but they cannot read and keep what had been thus comforting to them. They cannot remember it nor recur to it. It was but a voice. They would be assisted by a book, that can be taken up in a solitary hour and in moods that most require and best receive its divine lessons.

Our readers may possibly be ready to suspect that, according to the views here presented, no such book can be written; since so many endowments are supposed to be essential to the prosperous undertaking of it, and so much is demanded of the completed work. But we are not of this opinion; or we should not have placed the title of the volume on which we desire to say a few words at the head of this article. Nor do we think that the readers of the book will be struck with any great disparity between the requisitions we have made and the manner in which it comes up with them. We feel sure that it will reward the careful perusal of those to whom it is addressed. And we must include in this company all who suffer, and all who are conscious that they must suffer; every spirit, stricken or not, that meditates soberly the fortunes and the ends of life, and desires to connect its feeble condition and timid thoughts with the persuasion of a Heavenly Father and an everlasting inheritance. Dr. Greenwood has here supplied a want that was greatly felt, and supplied it in the very best manner. Nothing careless or ordinary ever flows from his pen. He does not present to us a narrow field of ideas, or thoughts such as offer themselves readily to a superficial meditation. He spreads out a sufficient variety of topics, and treats them all with the vigor of an original as well as a cultivated mind, and with the delicate fervor of a heart deeply touched. There is a holy propriety, a calm earnestness, pervading his whole work; never descending from the elevation, nor departing from the tenderness, that belong to its themes. Even where he can only say what others have said before, he does not repeat others. Where there is no scope for invention or dis

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covery, he exhibits what is at hand with a graceful discrimination. If there is no demand for depth, it seems to cost him nothing to be beautiful. Whether he speaks of "God Incomprehensible," " AllPowerful," "Guardian of Souls ;" or of "Christ our Fellow-sufferer," and his "Crown of Thorns," and perpetual "Kingdom," "With us at Evening," and leaving us as "Nothing without " him; of "Voices from Heaven," or the "Sorrow and Joy " of earth; of the "Offices of Memory," or the "Walking by Faith;" of the "Lessons of Autumn," or the "Peaceful Sleep " of the night; he takes up each subject in its turn with the same reverent and gentle hand, and throws over them all the charms of a style that is peculiarly his own. He is essentially a poet, though he may never have amused himself with the composition of verses. sensibility and temperament of one; he has the imagination of one. He looks upon nature with an eye of love. He connects himself tenderly with the future and the past. He reaches, as if without an effort, the near and remote analogies that enable him to illustrate and impress his meaning. His periods not unfrequently swell like a chant. His method is a kind of metre. At the same time, his language is as simple as it is select. There is no tincture of affectation, no flourish of mere rhetoric, no pomp of imagery, no arduous climbing after something wonderful. His manner is at once plain and ornate. We see in every part the grave and thoughtful man, not striving to produce a transient effect, but filling his own spirit first with what is most precious and consoling to it, aud then declaring that of which it is full. He gives no exaggerated representations. He has no wish to color either brighter or darker than the plain truth. He neither trifles nor declaims. We never lose sight of the minister of the Gospel in the accomplished writer.

If any of our readers, less acquainted than ourselves with the gifts that entitle Dr. Greenwood to his reputation among us, should think this to be extraordinary praise, we can only reply that we could not in justice, abate the least word of it. And if they consider it to be the partial encomium of friendship, we believe that they mistake. They certainly do, if they ascribe any motive of partiality. For it does not enter at all into our purpose to commend an author who needs no such tribute from us, but only to recom