17. The brevity of the period allotted us to labor and to make sacrifices for the salvation of men. "A point of time, a moment's space," is all we have. What we do in charity, the labors we perform, the privations we suffer, must all be accomplished or endured soon. The distress we relieve, the souls we save, the joys we inspire, must feel the quickening hand of mercy without delay. Time is on his rapid wing. Thousands who need our help are perishing daily; the entire generation now occupying this stage of toil and probation, the great Destroyer will speedily sweep from the scene. Almost "in the twinkling of an eye" we shall stand together before the judgment throne. He who died to save the poor as well as the rich, the heathen as well as the evangelized, is now speaking from heaven; "whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." These are some of the intellectual views and obligations which should be _systematized_ in the mind, forming both inducements to, and a constituent part of, systematic beneficence. They should lie like blazing fuel on the heart, kindling their appropriate feelings and affections. I have briefly unfolded them, as a specimen of that process of reasoning and personal application, which, according to our mental laws, when attended by the Holy Spirit, is fitted to soften and harmonize the mind preparatory to benevolent action; a process which all, as rational beings, are bound to engage in and carry out. I know this part of the system requires unpleasant work. Most are willing to feel, but they would feel without principle; and if they act, they would act only from the impulse of the moment. They shrink from introspection; from working on their own hearts through the laborious operations of the intellect, so that the affections may be at once both right and rational. But if we would see the gorgeous palace towering in symmetry and grandeur, unpleasant work must be done; the rubbish must be removed, the soil excavated, the marble chiselled into form, and the unsightly timbers erected. Without these, though it might glitter in the sunbeams, it would be but a gossamer tissue. So this mental part is the bone and sinew, the life, of a system of beneficence. Confined to resolutions and conduct, its movements would be like the effects of galvanism on the muscles of the dead--unnatural and spasmodic. The truth is, there can be no system of action without some system both of intellectual views and of the moral sensibilities. All inconsistency among Christians arises from defects in one or other of these respects. The fountain is not invariably at the same height, and therefore the stream alternately swells and sinks. Resolutions are proverbially frail; and they are so, because they rest not on a mind consolidated by principles, and a heart glowing like a furnace with corresponding feelings. When resting on such a mind and heart, resolutions are not frail; but invincible as adamant.