agent _is_, let him resort at once to the fountain-head of spiritual exemplification, and say whether it matters most what Christ was or what he did. The worth of this particular thought is a separate consideration from that of the worth of any sound abstract idea to sufferers liable to a besetting personal recollection, or doubt, or care. But, before I speak of this, I must allude to a subject which causes inexpressible pain whenever it occurs to us sick prisoners. I have said how unavailing is luxury when the body is distressed and the spirit faint. At such times, and at all times, we cannot but be deeply grieved at the conception of the converse of our own state, at the thought of the multitude of poor suffering under privation, without the support and solace of great ideas. It is sad enough to think of them on a winter’s night, aching with cold in every limb, and sunk as low as we in nerve and spirits, from their want of sufficient food. But this thought is supportable in cases where we may fairly hope that the greatest ideas are cheering them as we are cheered; that there is a mere set-off of their cold and hunger against our disease; and that we are alike inspired by spiritual vigour in the belief that our Father is with us,--that we are only encountering the probations of our pilgrimage,--- that we have a divine work given us to carry out, now in pain and now in joy. There is comfort in the midst of the sadness and shame when we are thinking of the poor who can reflect and pray,--of the old woman who was once a punctual and eager attendant at church,--of the wasting child who was formerly a Sunday-scholar,--of the reduced gentleman or destitute student who retain the privilege of their humanity,--of “looking before and after.” But there is no mitigation of the horror when we think of the savage poor, who form so large a proportion of the hungerers,--when we conceive of them suffering the privation of all good things at once,--suffering under the aching cold, the sinking hunger, the shivering nakedness,--without the respite or solace afforded by one inspiring or beguiling idea.