Think of God as your constant benefactor—that he made you, that he sustains you in every moment of your existence—that, to express yourself with the simple energy of inspiration, in him you live, and move, and have your being—that in all the joys which are scattered over the pilgrimage of life, we see nothing but the kindness of God always exerting itself in our favor, and meeting us in every direction—that though we seldom look beyond the creatures which surround us, it is God who reigns in these creatures and makes them subservient to his most wise, his most gracious, his most benevolent purposes; that though in the hey-day of youth we are carried along the tide of gayety without care and without reflection, it is God who gives to the spirit of man all its cheerfulness; that though we stop short in our gratitude at the benefactor who relieved and at the friend who supported us, it is God who reigns over the constitution of the mind, and could by a single word of his power make every companion abandon us, and every friend look upon us with an altered countenance; that though I call the house in which I live my own, and find in the endearments of my family my repose and my happiness, it is God who gave me my home, who spreads security around it, and fills it with all its charities; that though my path in society be dignified by the homage and civility of my acquaintances, it is God who reigns in the human breast and administers all the delight of social intercourse; that though my eye expatiates in rapture on the landscape around us, it is the living God who beautifies the scene, and gives it all its magnificence and all its glory; in short, that everything we enjoy is a gift; that in whatever quarter happiness is met with, a burden of obligation and dependence lies upon us; that we have nothing which we did not receive—that our all is suspended on God, and that to him we owe all the praise, all the gratitude, all the obedience. Now will any man who is acquainted with the movements of his own breast, say that this praise and this obedience are actually given? Are not the pleasures of life often tasted without acknowledgment? Is not the conduct of life often proceeded in without any reference to the will and authority of him who is the author of it? Is not the mind in a state of habitual estrangement from God, his existence absent from our reflections, and his superintendency as a judge and as a lawgiver absent from our principles? Go to whatever quarter you please for happiness, there is no escaping the conclusion that God is the giver of it, in his pervading energy which gives effect and operation to all things. You can not fly out of his presence, nor repair beyond the limits of his sovereignty.—_From Dr. Chalmers._ [_January 11._]