Make sharp my sword against this body of sin, but most against my Delilah, my bosom sin. Deliver me from the tyranny of temptation; or give me power to subdue it. Confine the liberty of my wanton appetite, and give me temperance in a sober diet. Grant me a heart to strive with thee in prayer, and hopeful patience to attend thy leisure. Keep me from the habit of an idle life, and close mine ears against corrupt communication. Set thou a watch before my lips, that all my words may savour of sobriety. Preserve me from the vanity and pride of life, that I may walk blameless in my conversation. Protect me from the fellowship of the unclean, and from all such as are of evil report. Let thy grace, O God, be sufficient for me, to protect my soul from the buffettings of Satan. Make me industrious and diligent in my calling, lest the enemy get advantage over me. In all

my temptations let me have recourse to thee. Be thou my refuge when I call upon thee. Forgive, O God, the sins of my youth. Oh! pardon the multitudes of my secret sins. Increase my hatred to my former life, and strengthen my resolution for the time future. Hear me, O God, and let the words of my mouth be always acceptable to thee, O God, my strength and my Redeemer.

THE SABBATH-BREAKER.

His Profanation.

his

THE glittering prince that sits upon regal and imperial throne, and the ignoble peasant that sleeps within his sordid house of thatch, are both alike to God. An ivory temple, and a church

1

of clay, are prized alike by him. The flesh of bulls, and the perfumes of myrrh and cassła, smoke his altars with an equal pleasure. And does he make such difference of days? Is he, that was so weary of the new moons, so taken with the sun, to tie his Sabbath to that only day? The tenth in tithes is any one in ten, and why the seventh day not any one in seven? We sanctify the day, the day not us. But are we Jews? Are we still bound to keep a legal Sabbath in the strictness of the letter? Have the Gentiles no privilege by the virtue of Messiah's coming? or has the evangelical Sabbath no immunities? The service done, the day is discharged, my liberty restored and if I meet my profits or my pleasures then, I'll give them entertainment. If business call me to account, I dare afford a careful ear. Or, if my sports invite me, F'll entertain them with a cheerful heart. I'll go to

matins with as much devotion as my neighbour; I'll make as low obeisance and as just responses as any; but soon as evensong is ended, my church-devotion and my psalter shall sanctify my pew till the next Sabbath call. Were it no more for an old custom's sake, than for the good I find in Sabbaths, that ceremony might as well be spared. It is a day of rest: and what's a rest? A relaxation from the toil of labour: and what is labour but a painful exercise of the frail body? But where the exercise admits no toil, there relaxation makes no rest. What labour is it for the worldly man to compass sea and land to accomplish his desires? What labour is it for the impatient lover to measure Hellespont with his widened arms to hasten his delight? What labour for the youth to number music with their sprightly paces? Where pleasure is reconciled to labour, labour is but an ac

tive rest. Why should the Sabbath then, a day of rest, divorce thee from those delights that make thy rest? Afflict their souls that please, my rest shall be what most conduces to my heart's delight. Two hours will vent more prayers than I shall need, the rest remains for pleasure.

CONSCIENCE, Why start'st thou? A judgment strikes me from the mouth of heaven, and saith,

Whosoever doth any work on my Sabbath, his soul shall be cut off. Exod. xxxi. 14.

Exod. xx. 8.

Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day; six days shalt thou labour, and do all that thou hast to do; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. Exod. xxxi. 14.

Ye shall keep my Sabbath, for it is holy

unto you.