late them, then will it serve as a beacon to direct, to cheer, to comfort and support in the pursuit after holiness, and in the end eternal life.

b. Enthusiasm.

By the term enthusiasm we intend not that state which consists in the fervor of excited feeling, and which betrays itself in inordinate, excessive, and erroneous attention to some merely secondary object; or in exclusive attachment and indiscriminating obedience, to some blind impulse, operative in proportion to our ignorance of its nature and effects; and reckless of the consequences which may result from its indulgence but in that exaltation of the soul which consists in embracing with ardour, and cherishing with transport, and being influenced in action by the idea we form of the value of an object placed before us for pursuit, and towards the attainment of which we are constantly and powerfully directed. The degree of this enthusiastic energy should ever be proportioned to the real value of the boon placed before us as an object of desire; but this is not always the case, since it sometimes happens, that matters of very inferior moment, develop a high degree of enthusiasm in their pursuit; a failing which arises commonly in weak, or ill-educated minds, from permitting passion to govern principle; and from forgetting the noble object of enthusiastic daring, even the subjection of the feelings to the judgment.

Zeal is the principle on which the pursuit of good should be grounded, and this principle when cultivated into passion will form enthusiasm. It is true, that zeal may be either true or false; just, or unjust; noble and generous, or ignoble and selfish; its energies may be expended on trifles, and wasted on follies; it may become the undistinguishing slave of party; the patron of abuse because it is ancient; as if antiquity of ill had invested it with a sacredness which had deprived it of its primary character; it may be employed on objects of general good, and universal benevolence, or it may characterize the partizan of little, narrow, confined, and selfish views and feelings, emotions which extend not beyond the small circle in which accident, or circumstance, or birth, or connexion, or even locality, and a thousand similar contingencies may have placed him. But these are only proofs, that the original good principle has been acted upon by some debasing cause, and that all the good of man's perverted, corrupt, fallen nature is only evil. It will be therefore the object of the parent to give a right bias to enthusiasm; to cultivate zeal for worthy objects; to pursue them with intense desire, but to avoid most carefully this waste of mental energy upon low, or sordid, or unworthy designs.

Enthusiasm as applied to religion, is too generally a term of reproach, equivalent perhaps with that of methodist, or evangelical, and applied to those who are really in earnest, in the pursuit of

that which has been declared by the highest authority to be the great business of life; by those who are too weak to comprehend what can be meant by energy in pursuit of moral virtue, and piety, and obedience to the will of Heaven, and active benevolence to their fellow-creatures; and too wicked, practically to allow the awful, and heart-stirring sanctions of the Bible, the good and evil, which it sets before them, as the result of certain lines of conduct. It is a term which very generally results from the upbraidings of an evil conscience, the sad inheritance of those who know enough to be aware, and to feel that they themselves are not right, and to be conscious that the objects of their ridicule, if sincere, are really to be envied for their personal peace, the happiness of their enjoyments, and the solidity of their prospects; but they are too much under the influence of evil passion and prejudice to allow this conviction to others; and the convenient term of enthusiast, serves to throw a veil of hypothetical discredit, over opinions, and doctrines, and practice grafted upon them, which they cannot impugn by argument, and dare not controvert by a comparison of their effects. It is good, to be zealously affected in a good cause; therefore the enthusiastic pursuit of religious objects is to be cultivated, to be desired, to be encouraged, to be strengthened, to be perfected.

But every good thing is liable to abuse; every sterling virtue has its counterfeit; and there is such a thing as enthusiasm in religion, which

may be identified with the desire of the hypocrite. But true and false passion are easily distinguished; the one earnestly contends for the faith once delivered to the saints, and zealously strives to live a godly life as its product; the other is very little careful about effects; it will influence its subjects so that they will contend with vehemence, and frequently with ill-temper, for exclusive views of doctrine, in so far as these form a manifesto of the party under whose banner they have enlisted; they will support with powerful casuistry, and too generally with very little deference to the feelings of others, their own peculiar views of faith and practice, or rather the views of their sect; but they will be very little anxious, about the display of vital religion in their own hearts and lives; they will attach more importance to the manner of performing a religious ceremony, than to the rite itself; they will rest in the exterior observance, rather than in the grace which is concealed beneath it; they will stickle for some mode which has been sanctified by custom, and which is a mere excrescence upon Christianity; they will most earnestly contend for religion as a political agent, as a state engine, and they will support its political influence, but they will entirely forget, that its only safety, and its only worth, consists in its influence upon the temper and conduct of numbers; they will place the ban of irreligion upon all those who do not think precisely with themselves; they will strain at gnats and swallow

camels; and these enthusiasts are every where to be found, but fully as much in the cloister and the cathedral, as in the poor and ignorant, and because ignorant, less culpable sectary. With the latter, enthusiasm often assumes a grotesque appearance, and places peculiarity of manner and phraseology, and expression, in the room of that principle of true religion, which in the former has been supplanted by the decorations and outworks of a more imposing and powerful hierarchy! So true is it, that there is a zeal of God, "but not according to knowledge; for they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God." Romans x. 2, 3.

Besides there is an eagerness in pursuing good things, when neither the real end to be accomplished, nor the manner of attempting it are good; there may be a spirited defence of the outworks of Christianity, with very little Christian spirit; the truths of our Holy Religion may be warmly vindicated from the aspersions of speculative infidelity, with the unhallowed fire of practical atheism; the spirit of proselytism may actuate the heart, which remains untouched by the spirit of grace; a crusade against error and false doctrine may be zealously undertaken, when the great end of exertion is the exaltation of self, or the acquisition of a reputation for sanctity. Such was the zeal of Jehu, when he exclaimed, "Come with me, and see my zeal for the Lord." 2 Kings x. 16.