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oesy interest is in Our discourse. Despising the fotheri
God, a chasis simplici of expression strives for the conviction os satin rather With the substance, than With the poWers, of eloquenm. Thereiore accepi from me things, not claverbut meloty, Words, not deched up to charin a popularaudience With cultivaled rhetoric, but simple and suod istheir unuarnished truthfulness for tho proclamation of the divino mer . Accepi What is seli Miore it is spoken, Whathas not been accumulated with tardy patastaring during ths lapse of years, but has been inhaled in ono breath of ripening
mavering hither and thither, t sed about on the soam of this Misae age, and uncertain os my Wandering Meps, lino ingnothing of my real lite, and remote iram truth and light, Ι ed to regard it as a dissiculi matter, and Ospecialty as dissiculi in respect of my character at that time, that a man
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aliould bo ablo to put Oss What he had previo ly been; andalthough retaining ali his bodily structure, should bo himselfchanged in heari and foui. IIo ,' said I, is such a comversion possibie, that there inould be a sudden and rapiddives ent os est Whicli, either innato in us has hardened in the corruption of our materiai nature, or acquired by us hasbecome inveterate is long accustomed uset These things have become deeply and radicatly engrained Within M. When Mes he leam thrist Who has been used to liberalbanqueis and sumptuous feasta' And he who has boonglittering in gold and purple, and has been celebrated sor his
costly ature, When does he reduce himself to ordinary and simplo clothingi one Who has felt the charm of the fasces and of civic honoum shrinis hom coming a mere private and inglorious citigon. The man Who is attended by crowtios clienta, and dignissed by the numerous association os an ossicious train, regards it as a punishment When he is alone. It is inevitable, as it ever has been, that tho love of minoinould entice, pride inflate, anger inflame, covetousness di
quiet, crueity stimulate, ambition delight, lust hasten to ruin, with assuromenis that Will not let go their hold. 4. These Were my frequent thoughis. For as I mygelf Washeld in bonds by the innumerable errore of my previous lise,
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be gratesul for Whatever me do not ascribe to man's viriue
but declare to bo the gist os God; so that noW me sin notis the beginning of the work of faith, Whereas that me sinnia
and poWer to do is oven you in proportion to tho incroase of yοur spiritual grace. For there is not, as is the case Withearthly benefiis, any measure or stini in the dispensing of
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sicli, to purge out the sinins of foolisti fouis is restoredhealth, to bid peace to thoso that are at enmity, repose tocte violent, gentieness to the unmty,-by stariling threais toforce to avo themselves the impure and vagrant spirita that have betaken themselves into the dies of men whom th p pose to destron to drive them With heavy blows to comeout of them, to stretch them Out strumling, hQWling, groaning With increass of constantly rene ing pain, to beat themmith scourges, to rorat them Mith fire: the matter is carriedon there, but is not seen; the strohes inflicted are hidden, but the penalty is manifest. Thus, in respect of What moliave Hready bemn to be, tho Spirit that wo have received possesses iis οὐ liber of action; while in stat me have notyet changed our body and members, the carnal vlew is stilldarhenod by the clouds of this Worid. How great is this empire of the mind, and what a power it has, not alone thatitsoli is millidra n froin the mischievous associations of the worid, as one Who is purged and pure can suffer no stain osa hostile irruption, but that it becomes stili greater and stronger in iis might, so that it can rulo over ali the imperious host os the attaching adversisy With iis sWayl6. But in order that the characte isties of the divino may
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7. And no , ii you turn your eyes and Dur regards to thecities thomselves, you mill belloid a concourso more hau tWith sadness than any solitude. The gladiatorial games ars prepared, that blood may gladden the lust os cruel eyes. The dy is fed up With stronger food, and the vigorous mam oflimbs is onriched with bram and muscle, that the wretinfatisned for punishment may die a hardor death. Man is Mau tered that man may bo gratified, and tho initi that is bost abis to kill is an exercise and an art. Crime is not onlycommiuod, but it is tanglit. What can be said more inhuman, - hat more repulsive Training is undergone to acquire thepoWer to murder, and the achievement of murder is iis glor What state of things, I pray you, can that be, and What canit M lino, in Whicli men, Whom nono have condemned, offerthomsolves to the Wild beasts-men of ripo age, of suffciently beautifes person, clad in costly garmenta' Living men, in are adomed for a Voluntary death; Wretched men, they boastos their o n miseries. They fght with beasis, nes for their crime, but for their madness. Fathera look on their οὐ sons; a brother is in the arena, and his sister is hard by; and althougha grander display os pomp increases the price of the exhibition, yet, oh shamel even the mother Will pay the increaso in orderstat ine may be present at her οὐ miseries. A d in ioohingupon scenes so frightsul and so implous and w deadly, they donot seem to be aware that they are parricides With stela ves. 8. Ηenco turn your looks to the abominations, not less tobe deplored, of another hind of spectaclo. In the theatres also u mill bohold What may Weli cause you gries and shame. Itis tho tragie bushin Which relates in verse the crimes of ancientdays. The old horrora' of parricide and incest are unsoldod in action calculated to express the image of the truth, so
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stat, as the ages pass is, any crime that mas formerly com- mi d may not be semotten. Each generation is reminded by What it hears, that Whalaver has once been done may bedone again. Crimes never die out by the lapse of ages; wichedness is never abolished by process of time ; impie is
nover buriod in oblivion. Things which have now ceased to beactual desds of vico becomo examples. In the mimes, mor over, by the reaching of infami , tho spectastor is attractedoither is reconsider What he may have done in secret, or to
Vices, the matron, Who perchance had gone to the spectaclea modest moman, returas from it immodest. Stili further, What a degradation os morais it is, What a stimulus to abomia
gestures, against the covenant and law of one's birili, in gage in delati upon tho endurance of incestuma abominational
not suta a creatum suggesti He inflames the senses, hessaltem the affections, he drives out the more Vimmus eo science of a virtuous breast; nor is there Wanting authorivsor the enticing abomination, that the mischies may creepupon peopte With a lem perceptibis approach. They picture Venus immodest, mrs adultemus; and that Jupiter of thelas not more supremo in dominion than in vice, inflamed mithearthly lovo in the midst of his own inundere, noW g Wingwhite in the seathers of a swan, noW pouring d-n in a
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peoplo embruted with the madnem os vice deny that theyhave done, anc. yet hasten to do,-men with frenetied lusis ruining upon men, doing things whicli afford no gratificationeven to those who do them. I am deceived ii the man whois Milty Oi such things as theso does not accuse others of them. The depraved maligns tho depraved, and thinhs that he himself, though conscious os the guili, has escaped, as is
consciousness were not a sussicient condemnation. The samomople Who are accusers in public are criminals in private, condemning themselves at the fame time as they condemn
least of whicli they are guit . 10. But after considering the public mads stat of pittalis,
ter batiles of many hinds scatisred ab ad over the wholo orid, after exhibitions either bloody or infamous, aiter sto ominations os lusi, whether exposed for sale in brotheis orhidden Mihin the domestic wall-abominations, the audaci of Whicli is greater in proportion to the secre of the crime, ossibiy you may thinh that tho Forum at least is ireo frem such things, that it is neither exposed to exasperating mngs, nor polluted by the association os criminals. Thentum Dux gage in that direction: there you mill discoverthings more odious than ever, so that thence you Will bomore destrous os turning away your eyes, although the la sare carved on twelvo tables, and the statutes aro publiclyprescribed on braeten. tablets. Yet wrong is done in the midstes the laWs themselves; wichedness is committed in tho
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very tace of the statutes; innocence is not preserved evenin the place Where it is defended. By turns the rancour os disputants rages; and when peace is brohen among the togas,' the Forum echoes With the madness of strise. There close athand is tho speis and the sWord, and the executioner also; there is the claW that rears, the rach that stretches, tho firo stat bums up,-more tortures for one poor human body than
ho selis his sentence. He who sita to avenge crimes commits
them, and the judgo becomes the culprit, in order that tho
accused may peristi innocently. Crimes are everywhere common; and eve Where in the multiform character of sin, the pernicious polson acta by means of degraded miniis. One man larges a Will, another by a capital haud mahes a falso deposition; on the one hand, children are cheated of their inheritances, on the other, strangers are endo ed Withthela estates. The opponent mahes his charge, the falso accuser attacta, the witness defames, on ali sides the venalimpudenco of hired voices seis about tho falsification ofcha es, while in the meantimo the guilty do not even peristi Mith tho innocent. There is no fear about the laW'-no concem sor eithor inquisitor or judge; When the sentenco can be bought off for money, it is not cared sor. It is a crime noW among the guilty to be innocent; whoever does not imitate the wiched is an offence to them. The lawshme come to terms With crimes, and whateuer is public hasbegun to be allo ed. What can bo the modestri What cania tho integritri that prevatis there, When there are none to condemn the wiched, and one only meela Mith those whoought themselves to be condemnia Τ11. But that κε may not perchance appear as is We Were piching out extreme cases, and with the View of disparagement mero seehing to attract your attention to those thingsWhereos tho sad and revolting vie. may offend the gage of a Miter conscience, I Will now direct you to such things asthe worid in iis ignoranco accounts good. Among these also
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distinguished by his brilliant drem, glittering, as he thinlis, in his purple. Yet With What baseness has he purchased this glitteri What contempta of the proud has hs had fidit in
submit tot what hau ty thresholds has he as an early courtier besiegedi HOW many scornsul Doditeps of arrogant great men has he had to precede, thronged in tho crowdos clienta, that by and by a similar procession might attendand precede him With salutations,-a train Walting not upontiis person, but upon his powert for he has no claim to borogarded sor his character, but for his fasces. of these, finalty, you may see ths degrading end, When tho tim sorving sycophant has departed, and the hange on, deserting them, has defited the exposed fide of the man who has retired into a private condition. It is then that the mischiotidone to tho squandered familDestate Amite upon the com science, then the losses that have exhausted the fortune are