is danger, is it not foolish to delay? Where it may be destruction, is it not something worse than folly? I will arife, and go to my Father, &c. &c. &c.

CHAP. XXIII.

The Chriftian in the World.

THE only doctrinal truth," fays Bishop Sanderfon," which Solomon infifted on, when he took the whole world for his large but barren text, was, that all is vanity." This was not the verdict of a hermit railing from his cell at pleasures untasted, or at grandeur unenjoyed. Among the fons of men, not one had fought with more unremitted diligence, or had wider avenues to the search, for whatever good either skill or power could extract out of the world, than Solomon. No one could judge of the fweets which can be drawn from this grand Alembic, with higher natural abilities, or with deeper experimental wifdom. He did not defcant on the vanity of the world fo eloquently till he had confidered it accurate. ly, and examined it practically. He was

not

not contented, like a learned theorift, to collect his notions from philofophy or hif tory, or hearfay; he well knew what he faid," and whereof he affirmed." All upon which he fo pathetically preached he had feen with his eyes, heard with his ears, and, in his widely-roving fearch, had experienced in his own disappointed mind, and felt in his own aching heart. He goes on to prove, by an induction of particulars, the grand truth propounded in his thefis, the vanity of the world. He fhews, in a regular series of experiments, how he had ranfacked its treasures, exhausted its enjoyments, and, even to fatiety, revelled in its honours, riches, and delights. He had been an intellectual as well as fenfual voluptuary, and had emptied the refources of knowledge as well as of pleasure. Then reverting in the clofe of his difcourfe to the point from which he had fet out, he again pronounces, that all is vanity.

"The conclufion of the whole matter " which he draws from this melancholy argu

ment,

ment, as finely exhibited as penfively conceived, is a folemn injunction to others to remember, what it is to be feared the Preacher himself had fometimes forgotten, that the whole duty of man is to fear God, and keep his commandments; winding up his fine peroration with a motive in which every child of Adam is equally, is awfully concerned," because God fhall bring every work into judgment."

May not every real Christian, while his heart is touched with the affecting truth of the text, be admonished by this folemn vale. dictory declaration? May he not learn the leffon inculcated at lefs expence than it was acquired by this great practical mafter of the science of wisdom? If another fovereign was told there was no royal way to geometry, the King of Ifrael has opened a royal way to a more divine philofophy. By the benefit to be derived from contemplating this illuftrious inftance of "how little are the great," the Chriftian may set out where Solomon ended. He may be con

vinced of the vanity of the world at a price far cheaper than Solomon paid for it, by a way far fafer than his own experience. He may convert the experiment made by the royal Preacher to his own personal account. He may find in the doctrines of the Gofpel a confirmation of its truth, in its precepts a counteraction to its perils, in its promifes a confolation for its difappointments.

In this world, fuch as Solomon has vividly painted it, the Chriftian is to live-is to live, through divine affiftance, untainted by its maxims, uncontaminated by its practices. Man, being obviously defigned by his Creator for focial life, and fociety being evidently his proper place and condition, it seems to be his duty, not fo much to confider what degree of poffible perfection he might have attained in that ftate of feclufion to which he was never destined, as how he may usefully fill his allotted fphere in the world for which he was made; how he may confcientiously discharge the duties to which he is plainly called by providential ordina