of fruitless fpeculation, its defign is to fhow what improvement and advantage you may reap from the peculiar circumftances of the age in which you live.

The general obligations to "remem<ber your Creator in the days of your 66 youth," we mean not at prefent to deduce. They may be an object of future enquiry, alike profitable and pleafing. What we directly intend, is to confider the State of the Times, as an additional argument for Early Piety: an argument, if I am not miftaken, in fome respects new; I am fure, an argument highly worth the regard of every Young Man, who wishes to think foberly, to act virtuously, and to pass with fatisfaction, fecurity, and honour, through this life to a better. As for those who are not yet awake to ferious reflection, or who, if they are fometimes inclined to admit it, ftill fuffer themselves to be carried headlong by the torrent of fashionable vice, and

have no feeling of public concerns; I can fcarcely hope to imprefs them by what I am going to offer. If fuch are ever effectually refrained from evil, or excited to good, it must be brought about by admonitions of a more roufing and awful

nature.

That the practice of religion is not without its difficulties and hardships to any individual, at any period, in any country, we pretend not to deny, we with not to conceal. They will be experienced, in a greater or less degree, by every one who honeftly attempts it. But compare the cafe of a young perfon, living under the infpection of wife and worthy parents, friends, or inftructors, at a distance from the contagion of epidemical iniquity, in fome calm fequeftered scene, where the Janguage of profligacy is not heard, where the violence of party is yet unknown, where pleasure and innocence go hand in hand, and from which industry, fimpli

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city, and contentment, are not banished by the cares or the parade of wealth, by the refinements or the languor of luxurycompare, I fay, his cafe with that of a youth bred and fituated as are most youths of any figure in or about London, and other great towns through the kingdom. Are you not fruck with the extreme difference of the two conditions, in the view with which I mentioned them, namely, to prove that while both the young men fuppofed are equally bound to do their duty, as rational and moral agents, accountable to themselves and to their common Judge, the latter will find his tafk unspeakably more arduous than the former, and that to maintain his quiet and integrity at the fame time, will demand a much superior ftrength of principle? What I have to fay, therefore, is chiefly calculated for the youth of this capital, and fuch others as are nearly in the fame circumstances; but ftill on the fuppofition that they retain not only fome decency, but fome ambition

to excel. In a word, whether you contemplate the prefent ftate of Affairs, or of Morals, we fay that the practice of Religion will preserve your Tranquillity impregnable, and your Virtue untainted.

By Religion, we would be understood to fignify a lively, affectionate, and habitual fenfe of God, in conformity to the difcoveries he has given of himself, sanctifying and regulating the temper and conduct of his worshippers: a diftinction which has nothing to do with the minute diftinctions of fects, or the miferable difputes of bigots. And when we speak of preserving your Tranquillity impregnable, we fuppofe it will be affaulted, we grant it may be disturbed and fhaken; but would intimate that it cannot be destroyed, or overthrown, by any convulfions of the world, provided you are faithful to the interefts, and fortified by the confolations, of piety. It may be proper to add, that the Tran-" quillity in queftion, will be more or less: VOL. II.

animated and fatisfactory, according to the various characters or conditions of those who poffefs it; and that it is totally diftinct from conftitutional infipidity, ftoical indifference, or the contemptible selfishness of such as are engroffed by themfelves, and the contracted circle round them.

But what, will the gay and the youthful be ready to afk-what avails this fame thing called Tranquillity? It may, for aught we know, be defirable, to people worn out in the pursuits of pleasure and ambition, who can no longer enjoy the tumult of brifk ideas, and bold exertions but to fpirits all alive and vigorous, ftarting in the race of glory, and grasping at delight from every quarter, Tranquillity is only another name for dulnefs.Be-. lieve me, Gentlemen, you are mistaken. An habit of ferenity, or felf-poffeffion, is the very foundation of all heart-felt happiness; and they can enjoy nothing to

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