hearts, the service of CHRIST our LORD'.' Then will follow good resolutions; the firm and steady purpose to be more wary and watchful for the future; to be more on one's guard against temptation; to be more strict with oneself. Some good habits also will be commenced. And every stage of the blessed process we have been describing will be attended with fervent prayer. By this, no eloquent address or lengthy form of supplication, is meant. We do but mean a cry like that of the Blind man,-LORD, that I might receive my sight:' a cry like that of the Leper, If Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean: a cry like that of the despised Publican,-GOD, be merciful to me a sinner!' We request you also to observe the phrase in which the prophet Joel recommends the duty on which we have been enlarging. Turn ye even to Me, saith the LORD,-with all your heart.' It is a very special note of the Divine commands that they require this entire surrender of the affections. A heart not perfect' before GOD, is refused and rejected by Him. He will have the whole heart, and accordingly, He calls Himself in a hundred places 'a jealous GOD.' Very b Bishop of Oxford. c St. Mark. x. 51. • St. Luke xviii. 13. : merciful, surely, even in this requirement, as well as very just for it is easier, far, to serve One whom we love entirely, than to render a wretched kind of half-service to him who has only a little piece of our affection . . . God demands therefore such a free and full, such a hearty and unfeigned conversion of ourselves to Him and He demands it specially at this time. : It does but remain that we implore every one who may have listened to what has been spoken, to accept it as an exhortation addressed to himself. The larger part of mankind need it but too plainly. Most of us have sunk into a deep slumber, and require to be awakened from it. The World has too many demands upon us. Every day brings with it too many duties which pertain to this life. Our hopes and fears, our cares and wishes, are all too many; and almost all of them have their beginning and their end in Time. We plant, and build, and heap up treasures, and lay plans, not for Eternity. We surely forget that here we have no abiding city; that four-score years are the outer boundary of the life allotted to man; that this fair Earth will be burnt up at the last, with all that it contains; and that he alone will stand immoveable in his lot, at the end of the days, who shall have turned himself to the LORD with his whole heart. Some plain practical hint has often been found of great service in enforcing a solemn duty. One easy precept of this kind shall now be offered. You will find it will much aid your obedience to the Divine Command which we have been considering, to commit to memory the Collect for Ash-Wednesday; and after learning it very exactly and faithfully, to repeat it, three times a day, throughout the forty days of Lent. The blessedness of this practice, and the help of it, will be discovered very soon by him who makes the trial in a humble spirit. It will assure the weak and doubting that the Author of their being hates nothing which His gracious Hands have made; but forgives the sins of all them that are penitent. It will at the same time remind all to implore Almighty GOD to create and make in them new and contrite hearts; to lament their sins, and acknowledge their wretchedness; and to seek of Him, the God of all Mercy, perfect remission and forgiveness, through JESUS CHRIST our LORD. The First Sunday in Lent. MAN SHALL NOT LIVE BY BREAD ALONE. ST. MATTH. iv. 4. He answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of GOD. THE forty days of Lent, which Christian men observe in memory of the forty days during which our LORD fasted in the wilderness, begin on Ash-Wednesday. Those days of fasting were days of Temptation also: and, accordingly, the Temptation of CHRIST forms the subject of this Day's Gospel. We are about to invite your attention to that great event; and have chosen for our special meditation one portion of it, which will be found to suggest a train of thought suitable to the entire season, as well as to furnish help and guidance to us all. Our LORD's Temptation, next to His Death and Passion, is the greatest event recorded of Him in the Gospel. The reason of this is evident. It was MESSIAH's first encounter with His great Enemy, Satan. Viewed aright, the scene so simply and briefly described in Scrip ture, is the most terrific which can be imagined, as well as the most sublime: for we cannot forget that it is none other than a contest, on the issue of which depended the Salvation of all Mankind. On the one side was the Eternal SON, made flesh; sinless indeed, yet compassed with all the infirmity of man's fallen nature : on the other, the chief of the fallen angels, Satan; that old Serpent, who in the beginning by deceiving our first parents had brought Death, and Sin, and Sorrow into the world. The Eternal SON, I say, stood on one side: the same who in the beginning' had created Man upright; and behold, all His works had been found to be 'very good;' while opposed to Him stood the Enemy who had marred and disfigured that good work, and brought in Ruin everywhere. Now, any interview between the Holy and Almighty One, and the Prince of the Evil Spirits, cannot but be brimful of awe and wonder. But the interview described in the Gospel is far more wondrous than might be thought from any thing which has yet been said; as will at once appear from the following considerations : 1st, There had been a prophecy, given in the beginning, that the Seed of the Woman should |