infirmity was blended with the virtues of the most illustrious of these characters, behold all their respective and detached excellencies, concentring in their most bright assemblage, without frailty or sin, in the sacred person and spotless life of the blessed Jesus. In him, the scattered rays of human and angelic excellence all meet, and from him they derive their irradiation. And it is in Jesus alone that you see all the essence, and all the loveliness of religion exemplified; because of him alone it is true “that he was holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners.” Form your ideas, in both respects, from him; and from that excellence in every character, that most resembles him. “Let that mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.” Phil. ii. “Be ye followers of me, says Paul, even as I also am of Christ.” And then say, whether religion does not surpass in beauty and excellence, every thing below; that assumes the name of the one or the other. What is it that guides reason, sanctifies philosophy, adorns literature? What, but religion? Without which, the sublimest style of mental exertion may be not only useless in the end, but even pernicious. What is the loveliest form, or the lustre of the fairest countenance, unaccompanied with those tempers and that demeanor, which religion teaches? What is the crowning accomplishment in all those graces, that charm the beholder, and make the possessor of them happy? Religion. Of how much greater worth is the aspect of benevolence, the look of modesty, the calm reply, the gentle and unassuming carriage, than all the blooming tincture of a skin! In vain do the rose and lily diversify their lovely tints to beautify that countenance, which covers a heart full of pride and vanity. Even when disease or age makes ravages on external charms, religion possesses the exclusive power of rendering itself amiable under all these disadvantages, and of communicating loveliness amidst all the ruins of declining nature. But, without religion, how awful the idea of a form, once the object of adoration, consumed by disease and turned into putrefaction by death! once the fair enclosure of a mind, the seat of sin, and now separated, for a season, from those tempers, which being let loose upon the soul, fill it, in its disembodied state, with misery and terror; and, when returning, as they will do in the morning of the resurrection, will complete the unhappiness and disgrace of soul and body for ever! Solemn reflection! Sufficient, one would think, to inspire parents with the ambition of instilling religion, as the grand endowment, into the minds of their children; and to make their offspring anxious to seek the one thing needful. In short, the most elaborate mode of education, in which this is omitted, is but a refined mode of training up the rising generation to the most certain destruction. It is religion that gives the loveliest charms to youth, and makes the hoary head a crown of glory.