were in itself sinful, if it actually could not be carried on without sin, there would be no room for debate; it must be abandoned at once, though utter destitution might seem the inevitable consequence. But if the employment be only dangerous, if it only require a greater measure of circumspection, vigilance, and boldness, the forsaking it may prove timidity rather than prudence; a disposition to evade, rather than to conquer.

It is too common to judge power by station, and to compute the influence which a man may exert over others, by the temporal advantages which fall to his lot. But there is a power in religion, irrespective altogether of worldly sta tion: a power which may indeed be used more extensively, if its possessor have command of other forces besides, but which may work the very finest results, supposing him to have nothing We doubt, for example, whether a else to wield. We refer chiefly to the man, roused to the great work of the power of a consistent example; and we saving the soul, could lawfully seek to should confidently say to the religious place himself in the midst of the temp- servant in the irreligious family, that it tations of a court, and surround himself is hardly possible to overrate the service with those hinderances to spiritual reli- which he, or she, may render to the gion which too often abound in the cause of christianity. We are not suppalaces of princes. But it would make posing the servant to travel beyond the all the difference if he were a courtier immediate duties of his station, for it is at the time of his being first made to feel no recommendation of religion when that he had a soul; a court is a lawful, persons put themselves forward, and though a dangerous, residence; and it assume offices to which they have never may not only be allowable, it may even be been called. We only suppose the serrequired that he should continue where vant to carry his christianity in all his he is, and take advantage of his position to occupations, and this will be sure to adorn and diffuse christianity. It might make him the most respectful, faithful, not look like a saint to seek employment and diligent in the domestic establishin the household of Cæsar; but it may ment. He will be quickly distinguished be the very part of a saint not to with- from others by closer attention to his draw from the household, and descend master's interests, by greater care of into humble life. A religious servant his master's property, by a stricter admight not be justified in wilfully entering herence to truth, and by a more obliging an irreligious family, where he knew and submissive deportment. It is nothat piety would be discountenanced in thing to tell us that, often, where there is every possible way; but if he have be- a religious profession, there are few or come religious whilst serving in the irre- none of these characteristics; this is ligious family, it may be lawful for him only telling us that hypocrisy is confined to remain, nay, it may be unlawful for to no class of life, but may flourish him to leave: it is lawful for him to re-equally in the kitchen and parlor. Let main, if he be not required to act against his conscience; it is unlawful for him to leave, if distinct opportunity be afforded him of doing honor to God, and promoting Christ's cause. And this latter supposition will probably hold good in the majority of cases. When one member of an irreligious household is converted, we regard him as the particle of leaven, placed by God in the midst of an unsound mass; and the circumstances must be very peculiar, which would seem to us to warrant the withdrawment of this particle, so that the mass should be again void of any righteous element.

We have great pleasure in contemplating the moral power with which God has invested the meanest of his people.

there be real religion, and whatever a man's station, it will show itself in the performance of the duties of that station. The rule admits no exceptions, for religion seats itself in the heart, and thence influences all the actions. Therefore, if there be one, in a mass of irreligious domestics, whom the Spirit of God has brought to repentance and faith, that one will rapidly distinguish himself from the rest by superior civility, diligence and honesty.

And it is just because true religion will thus necessarily display itself in the practice, that we ascribe to it a power, in every rank of life, of acting silently upon others, and assimilating them to itself. Let the irreligious master perceive that there is no one in his household so trust

solitary convert, one who held but a mean place in the imperial household, and who may have desired to escape at once from a scene where there seemed to be so many by whom he might be injured, so few to whom he could do good? But he may have been admonished to remain; and by the mere force of a consistent deportment, he may have borne down much of the opposition to christianity, till at last, though he prevailed not to the bringing over the bloody emperor himself, he was surrounded by a goodly company of believers, and a church of the Redeemer rose in the very midst of the palace of the Cæsars. And whether or not it were thus, through the influence of a solitary convert, that the religion of Jesus established itself in the most unpromising scene, the great truth remains beyond controversy, that a post is not to be forsaken because it cannot be occupied without peril to personal piety. Let, therefore, any amongst yourselves, who may be disposed to abandon the station in which God has placed them, because of its dangers and trials, consider whether they may not have been thus circumstanced for the very purpose of being useful to others; and whether, then, it does not become them to persist in hope, rather than to desert it in fear. For very difficult would it be to show that any can have more cause to seek a change of service, than men converted from amongst the courtiers and domestics of Nero; and, nevertheless, these christians, with an apostle for their immediate instructor, adhered steadfastly to the employments in which conversion had found them; so that they were to be known by the striking description, "The saints that are of Cæsar's household."

worthy as the professed disciple of Christ, fligate emperor. Who knows whether no one on whose word he can place there may not, at first, have been a such dependence, no one who serves him with equal industry and alacrity; and it can hardly fail but that this master will gradually receive an impression favorable to religion, whatever may have been hitherto his opposition and prejudice. There is something mightily ennobling in this; for the meanest in a household, whose days are consumed in the lowest drudgeries of life, is thus represented as invested with a high power of winning triumphs for christianity, and turning many to righteousness. There may be families to which the preacher of the Gospel can gain no access; they will not come to listen to him on the Sabbath, and would scowl on him as an intruder in the week. And what instrumentality is there, through which to act on such families, barred up, as they are, against both the public and the private ministrations of the word? Nothing would be so hopeful as the instrumentality of pious domestics; and, therefore, God forbid that such domestics should hastily withdraw themselves from the households. We look to the pious servant to do what the minister of the Gospel has no opportunities of doing, to publish and recommend the doctrine of Christ, not by officious interference, and unbecoming reproof, and unaskedfor advice; but by blamelessness of conduct, by devotedness to duty, by fidelity, by humility, by obligingness. We send that servant as our missionary into the very midst of the inaccessible family; not to deliver messages with his lip, but to deliver them through his life; and we can almost venture to predict, that if he do indeed, according to St. Paul's direction to servants, "adorn the doctrine of God the Savior in all things," it will gradually come to pass that religion conciliates some measure of respect, that those above him, and around him, inquire into his motives, and perhaps even seek for themselves what works so beautifully in another.

But if we may fairly contend that such an influence as this is wielded by a righteous domestic in an unrighteous family, we can feel no surprise, that, when God had won to himself servants from amongst the servants of Nero, he permitted, and perhaps even commanded, heir remaining in the service of the proVOL. II.

But we have not yet exhausted the instructive truths which seem fairly deducible from the simple statement of our text. We felt, as we insisted on the last lesson

the lesson as to the duty of remaining in a perilous position-that some might feel as though we required them to injure themselves for the benefit of others; and when it is the soul which is at stake, there may be doubts whether a sacrifice such as this can be lawful. We maintained it to be right that Cæsar's house

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hold should not be deserted by the saints, | ly quiet because not solicited, and that

them earnest in prayer and diligent in labor, and they will prove their best helps in working out salvation. Witness the chiefly" of our text. There were none

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in Rome, in whom the flame of christian love was so bright, as in those confined to the most polluted of atmospheres. God appointed them their station: they submitted in obedience to his will; and the result was, that the lamp, which you would have thought must have gone out in so pestilential an air, burnt stronger and clearer than in any other scene.

employed on what tends to increase worldly-mindedness? It will probably be from situations such as this, that God shall gather into the kingdom of heaven the most eminent of his servants. It may not be from cloistered solitudes, where piety had but little to contend with, that the distinguished ones shall advance when Christ distributes the prizes of eternity-it may rather be from the court, where worldliness reigned; from the exchange, where gold was the idol; and from the family, where godliness was held in derision. Not that Look, then, upon your enemies as there may not be exalted piety where your auxiliaries, upon your dangers as there has not been extraordinary trial. your guardians, upon your difficulties as But the extraordinory trial, met in God's your helps. Christian men, and chrisstrength, which is always sufficient, will tian women, ye of whom God asks most be almost sure to issue in such prayer- in asking you to be his servants, for you fulness, such faith, such vigilance, such he reserves most, if, indeed, ye be “faithdevotedness, as can hardly be looked for ful unto death." The "chiefly" of the where there is but little to rouse, to alarm, text may be again heard; they who have and to harass. Therefore, let those be been first in godliness shall be first in of good cheer, who, if pious at all, must glory: and when Christ is saying, be pious in spite of a thousand hinder-“Come, ye blessed of my Father," it may ances and disadvantages. Let these be with this addition, "chiefly they that hinderances and disadvantages only make | were of Cæsar's household."

SERMON VI.

THE SLEEPLESS NIGHT.

'On that night could not the king sleep; and he commanded to bring the book of records of the chronicles, and they were read before the king."-ESTHER VI. 1.

It will be necessary for us to enter | Providence of God. The king of the somewhat minutely into the circum- vast Persian Empire, of which Judea stances connected with what is here mentioned, that you may be prepared for the inferences which we design to draw from the passage. The Book of Esther is among the most interesting of the narratives contained in the Old Testament, furnishing proofs, as remarkable as numerous, of the ever-watchful

was at this time a province, had put from him his queen, in a moment of caprice and indignation, and advanced to her place a Jewess, named Esther, remarkable for her beauty, and as it afterwards appeared, for her piety and courage. This Esther, who had been left an orphan, had been brought up as

his daughter by her cousin Mordecai, then shall perish; but with him shall