career, and smoothing its eddies into an even flow: while, deep embosomed in the verdant mead, it glides through the cherished and smiling herbage sometimes lost amidst closing willows; sometimes emerging with fresh beauty from the leafy covert; always roving with an air of amorous complacency as though it would caress the fringed banks and flowery glebe. Reminded by this watery monitor, of that constancy and vigour with which the affec tions should move towards the great centre of happiness, Christ Jesus; of that determined ardour with which we should break through the entangle ments of temptation, and obstacles of the world, in order to reach our everlasting rest; and of the mighty difference between the turbulent, the frothy, the precipitate gratifications of vice, and the calm, the substantial, the per manent delights of religion.

Or else, with eager view, we have surveyed the extensive prospect, and wandered over all the magnificence of things-an endless variety of graceful objects and delightful scenes! each soliciting our chief regard; every one worthy of our whole attention; all conspiring to touch the heart with mingled transport of wonder, of gratitude, and of joy. So that we have returned from our rural expedition, not as the spendthrift from the gaming table, cursing his stars, and raving at his ill luck, gulled of his money, and the derided dupe of sharpers; not as the libertine from the house of wantonness, surfeited with the rank debauch, dogged by shame, goaded by remorse, with a thousand recent poisons tingling in his veins. But we returned as ships of commerce from the golden continent, or the spicy islands, with new accessions of sublime improvement and solid pleasure; with a deeper veneration for the Almighty Creator; with a warmer sense of his unspeakable favours; and with a more inflamed desire "to know him now by faith, and after this life to have the fruition of his glorious Godhead.”

Sometimes, with an agreeable relaxation, we have transferred our cares from the welfare of the nation to the flourishing of the farm; and instead of enacting regulations for the civil community, we have planned schemes for the cultivation of our ground and the prosperity of our cattle. Instead of attending to the course of fleets and the destination of armies, we have directed the plough where to rend the grassy turf, or taught the honeysuckle to wind round the arbour, and the jessamine to climb upon the wall. Instead of interposing our friendly offices to reconcile contending kingdoms, we have formed a treaty of coalition between the stranger scion and the adopting tree; and by the remarkable melioration of the ensuing fruit, demonstrated (would contending empires regard the precedent!) what advantages flow from pacific measures and an amicable union. Instead of unravelling the labyrinths of state, and tracing the finesses of foreign courts, we have made ourselves acquainted with the politics of Nature, and observed how wonderfully, how mysteriously, that great projectress acts. In this place she rears a vast trunk, and unfolds a multiplicity of branches from one small berry. She qualifies, by her amazing operations, a few contemptible acorns, that were formerly carried in a child's lap, to bear the British thunder round the globe, and secure to our island the sovereignty of the ocean. In another place she produces, from a dry grain, first the green blade, then the turgid ear, afterwards the full-grown and ripened corn in the ear, Mark iv. 28; repaying, with exact punctuality, and with lavish usury, the husbandman's toil and the husbandman's loan; causing, by a

most surprising resurrection, the death of one seed to be fruitful in the birth of hundreds.

But I forget your caution, Aspasio; forget how kindly you have checked me, when I have been haranguing upon, I know not what, powers and works of nature; whereas it is God who "worketh hitherto," John v. 17; who to this day exerts, and to the end of time will exert that secret but unremitted energy, which is the life of this majestic system, and the cause of all its stupendous operations. Let this show you how much I want my guide, my philosopher, and friend. Without his prompting aid, my genius is dull, my reflections are awkward, and my religious improvements jejune; somewhat like the bungling imitations of the tool, compared with the masterly effects of vegetation. However, I will proceed; yet not from any view of informing my Aspasio, but only to draw a bill upon his pen, and lay him under an obligation to enrich me with another letter upon the grand and excellent subject of his last.

Art is dim-sighted in her plans, and defective even in her most elaborate essays. But Nature, or rather Nature's sublime Author, is indeed a designer, and "a workman that need not be ashamed," 2 Tim. ii. 15. His eye strikes ont ten thousand elegant models, and his touch executes all with inimitable perfection. What an admirable specimen is here of the divine skill, and of the divine goodness! This terraqueous globe is intended not only for a place of habitation, but for a storehouse of conveniencies. If we examine the several apartments of our great abode, if we take a general inventory of our common goods, we shall find the utmost reason to be charmed with the displays, both of nice economy, and of boundless profusion.

Observe the surface of this universal messuage. The ground, coarse as it may seem, and trodden by every foot, is nevertheless the laboratory where the most exquisite operations are performed; the shop, if I may so speak, where the finest manufactures are wrought. Though a multitude of generations have always been accommodated, and though a multitude of nations are daily supplied by its liberalities, it still continues unexhausted-is a resource that never fails, a magazine never to be drained.

The unevenness of the ground, far from being a blemish or a defect, heightens its beauty, and augments its usefulness. Here it is scooped into deep and sheltered vales, almost constantly covered with a spontaneous growth of verdure, which, all tender and succulent, composes an easy couch, and yields the most agreeable fodder for the various tribes of cattle. There it is extended into a wide, open, champaign country, which, annually replenished with the husbandman's seed, shoots into a copious harvest; a harvest, not only of that principal wheat which is the staff of our life and strengthens our heart, but of the "appointed barley," Isa. xxviii. 25, and various other sorts of grain, which yield an excellent food for our animals, and either enable them to despatch our drudgery, or else fatten their flesh for our tables.

The furrows, obedient to the will of man, vary their produce. They bring forth a crop of tall, flexile, slender plants*, whose thin filmy coat, dried, attenuated, and skilfully manufactured, transforms itself into some of the most necessary accommodations of life, and genteelest embellishments of society. It is wove into ample volumes of cloth, which, fixed to the mast, give wings to our ships, and waft them to the extremities of the ocean.

* Flax and hemp.

It

is twisted into vast lengths of cordage, which add nerves to the crane, and lend sinews to the pulley; or else, adhering to the anchor, they fasten the vessel even on the fluctuating element, and secure its station even amidst driving tempests. It furnishes the duchess with her costly head-dress, and delicately fine ruffles. No less strong than neat, it supplies the ploughman with his coarse frock, and the sailor with his clumsy trousers. Its fibres, artfully arranged by the operations of the loom, cover our tables with a graceful elegance, and surround our bodies with a cherishing warmth. On this the painter spreads the colours which enchant the eye; in this the merchant packs the wares which enrich the world.

Yonder the hills, like a grand amphitheatre, arise. Amphitheatre! All the pompous works of Roman magnificence are less than mole-banks, are mere cockle-shells, compared with those majestic elevations of the earth. Some clad with mantling vines; some crowned with towering cedars; some ragged with mishapen rocks, or yawning with subterraneous dens, whose rough and inaccessible crags, whose hideous and gloomy cavities, are not only a continual refuge for the wild goats, but have often proved an asylum to persecuted merit *, and a safeguard to the most valuable lives.

At a greater distance, the mountains lift their frozen brows, or penetrate the clouds with their aspiring peaks. Their frozen brows arrest the roving and condense the rarefied vapours. Their caverned bowels collect the dripping treasures, and send them abroad in gradual communications by trickling springs; while their steep sides precipitate the watery stores, rolling them on with such a forcible impulse, that they never intermit their unwearied course till they have swept through the most extensive climes, and regained their native seas.

The vineyard swells into a profusion of clusters, some tinged with the deepest purple, and delicately clouded with azure; some clad with a whitish transparent skin, which shows the tempting kernels lodged in luscious nectar The vine requires a strong reflection of the sunbeams, and a very large proportion of warmth. How commodiously do the hills and mountains minister to this purpose! May we not call those vast declivities the garden-walls of nature? which, far more effectually than the most costly glasses, or most artful green-houses, concentrate the solar heat, and complete the maturity of the grape, distending it with a liquor of the finest scent, the most agreeable relish, and the most exalted qualities! such as dissipate sadness, and inspire vivacity; such as make glad the heart of man, and most sweetly prompt both his gratitude and his duty to the munificent Giver. I grieve and I blush for my fellow-creatures, that any should abuse this indulgence of Heaven, that any should turn so valuable a gift of God into an instrument of sin-turn the most exhilarating of cordials into poison, madness, and death.

The kitchen- garden presents us with a new train of benefits. In its blooming ornaments, what unaffected beauty! In its culinary productions. what diversified riches! It ripens a multitude of nutrimental esculents, and almost an equal abundance of medicinal herbs; distributing refreshments to the healthy, and administering remedies to the sick. The orchard, all fair and ruddy, and bowing down beneath its own delicious burden, gives us a

To David from Saul's malice; to Elijah from Jezebel's vengeance; to many of the primitive Christians, from the rage of persecuting emperors: "They wandered in deserts and in mountains, in dens and caves of the earth," Heb. xi. 38.

Fresh demonstration of our Creator's kindness; regales us first with all the delicacies of summer fruits; next, with the more lasting succession of autumnal dainties.

What is nature but a series of wonders, and a fund of delights! That such a variety of fruits, so beautifully coloured, so elegantly shaped, and so harmingly flavoured, should arise from the earth, than which nothing is more insipid, sordid, and despicable! I am struck with pleasing astonishment at the cause of these fine effects, and no less surprised at the manner of bringing them into existence. I take a walk in my garden, or a turn through my orchard, in the month of December: there stand several logs of wood astened to the ground: they are erect, indeed, and shapely, but without ither sense or motion: no human hand will touch them, no human aid will necour them; yet in a little time they are beautified with blossoms, they are covered with leaves, and at last are loaded with mellow treasures, with the downy peach and the polished plum, with the musky apricot and the juicy jar, with the cherry and its coral pendents, glowing through lattices of

reen;

-and dark

Beneath her ample leaf, the luscious fig.

I have wondered at the structure of my watch; wondered more at the description of the silk-mills; most of all at the account of those prodigious. engines invented by Archimedes. But what are all the inventions of all the cometricians and mechanics in the world, compared with these inconceivably nice automata * of nature! These self-operating machines despatch their business with a punctuality that never mistakes, with a dexterity that cannot be equalled. In spring they clothe themselves with such unstudied, but exquisite finery, as far exceeds the embroidery of the needle, or the Labours of the loom. In autumn they present us with such a collation of sweetmeats, and such blandishments of taste, as surpass all that the most critical luxury could prepare, or the most lavish fancy imagine. So that those coarse and senseless logs first decorate the divine creation, then perform the honours of the table.

If, amidst these ordinary productions of the earth, God appears so "great in counsel, and mighty in work," Jer. xxxii. 19, what may we expect to see in the palaces of heaven, in the hierarchies of angels, and in that wonderful Redeemer who is, beyond all other objects, beyond all other manifestations, the "wisdom of God, and the power of God?" 1 Cor. i. 24.

The forest rears myriads of massy bodies, which, though neither gay with blossoms, nor rich with fruit, supply us with timber of various kinds, and of every desirable quality. But who shall cultivate such huge trees, diffused over so vast a space? The toil were endless. See, therefore, the all-wise and ever-gracious ordination of Providence. They are so constituted, that they have no need of the spade and the pruning-knife. Nay, the little cares of man would diminish, rather than augment, their dignity and their usefulness. The more they are neglected, the better they thrive, the more wildly grand and magnificent they grow.

When felled by the axe, they are sawed into beams, and sustain the roofs of our houses; they are fashioned into carriages, and serve for the conveyance

Automata, or self-operating machines; not meant to set aside the superintendency of Providence, but only to exclude the co-operation of man.

of the heaviest loads. Their substance so pliant, that they yield to the chisel of the turner, and are smoothed by the plane of the joiner; are wrought inte the nicest diminutions of shape, and compose some of the finest branches household furniture. Their texture so solid, that they form the most impor tant parts of those mighty engines which, adapting themselves to the play of mechanic powers, despatch more work in a single hour than could other wise be accomplished in many days. At the same time, their pressure is 80 light that they float upon the waters, and glide along the surface, almost with as much agility as the finny fry glance through the deep. Thus, while they impart magnificence to architecture, and bestow numberless conveniences on the family, they constitute the very basis of navigation, and give expedie tion, give being, to commerce.

Amidst the inaccessible depths of the forests, an habitation is assigned for those ravenous beasts, whose appearance would be frightful, and their neigh bourhood dangerous to mankind. Here the sternly majestic lion rouses himself from his den, stalks through the midnight shades, and awes the savage herd with his roar. Here the fiery tiger springs upon his prey, and the gloomy bear trains up her whelps. Here the swift leopard ranges, and the grim wolf prowls, and both in quest of murder and blood. Were these horrid animals to dwell in our fields, what havock would they make? what consternation would they spread? But they voluntarily bury themselves in the deepest recesses of the desert; while the ox, the horse, and the serviceable quadrupeds, live under our inspection, and keep within our call; profiting us as much by their presence, as the others oblige us by their absence.

If at any time those shaggy monsters make an excursion into the habitable world, it is when man retires to his chamber, and sleeps in security. The sun, which invites other creatures abroad, gives them the signal to retreat. "The sun ariseth, and they get them away, and lay them down in their dens," Psal. civ. 22. Strange! that the orient light, which is so pleasing to us, should strike such terror on them! should, more effectually than a legion of guards, put them all to flight, and clear the country of those formidable enemies!

If we turn our thoughts to the atmosphere, we find a most curious and exquisite apparatus of air, which, because no object of our sight, is seldom observed, and little regarded; yet is a source of innumerable advantages; and all these advantages (which is almost incredible) are fetched from the very jaws of ruin. My meaning may be obscure, therefore I explain myself. We live plunged, if I may so speak, in an ocean of air, whose pressure, upon a person of moderate size, is equal to the weight of twenty thousand pounds. Tremendous consideration! Should the ceiling of a room, or the roof of a house, fall upon us with half that force, what destructive effects must ensuc! Such a force would infallibly drive the breath from our lungs, or break every bone in our bodies. Yet so admirably has the divine wisdom contrived this aerial fluid, and so nicely counterpoised its dreadful power. that we receive not the slightest hurt-we suffer no manner of inconvenience —we even enjoy the load. Instead of being as a mountain on our loins, it is like wings to our feet, or like sinews to our limbs. Is not this common ordination of Providence, thus considered, somewhat like the miracle of the burning bush, whose tender and combustible substance, though in the midst of flames, was neither consumed nor injured? Exod. iii. 2. Is it not almost